


The Black Forest

by theselittlethings



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Breathplay, Canon Universe, Conflicted Rey, Dark Rey (Star Wars), Dirty Talk, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Choking, Force Visions, Ghosts, Haunting, Horror, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Kashyyyk, Kylo Ren and Rey Are Not Related, Light Bondage, Minor Character Death, Minor Finn/Rose Tico, Mutual Masturbation, Orgasm Delay, POV Rey (Star Wars), Poe Dameron Makes Poor Decisions, Porn With Plot, Possession, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Rey & Kylo Go Camping, Rey Needs A Hug, Reylo - Freeform, Rough Sex, Secret Relationship, Seduction to the Dark Side, Semi-Public Sex, Sexual Roleplay, Stream of Consciousness, Suspense, Technically Canon Compliant But Without Any of the Modesty & Optimism, The Author Regrets Nothing, The Dark Side of the Force, Things Will Get Dark But Slowly, Vaginal Sex, Yes There Is A Haunted Forest On Kashyyyk, eventual pregnancy, it's not looking good for The Resistance, not a slow burn, oh god please don't be related
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-22
Updated: 2018-09-30
Packaged: 2019-04-26 10:48:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 123,669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14400549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theselittlethings/pseuds/theselittlethings
Summary: The Resistance has been reduced to a fraction of its numbers and resources after their close escape from Crait. The surviving members seek refuge in an abandoned treehouse hunting lodge on Kashyyyk where few locals set foot due to the legends about the forest to the northwest of their encampment. Rey struggles to find her place in this new life so soon after leaving everything she ever knew in Jakku, and her bond with Kylo Ren remains intact despite Snoke’s death. They continue to grow closer as the Resistance becomes more fractured, and Rey is tempted by the Dark Side in more ways than she ever expected.AND/ORA spooky, sexy, and dark canonverse story.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> ***TAGS UPDATED 01/09/19. If you came here from my works thread on Twitter, check tags again first.
> 
> This is my first fanfic in fifteen years and I apologize ahead of time if I'm unaware of certain rules of etiquette. I don't know how to write happy & fluffy and as such this story takes more than a few dark turns. Story is fully outlined and will be updated as it's completed. All kudos, comments, views, and feedback are greatly appreciated & give me life. Here we go :)

Rey is not surprised when she looks up from her caf and sees Kylo standing behind Finn’s shoulder, leaning up against the wooden walls of the treehouse she’s shared with Rose since arriving on Kashyyyk. His hands are behind his back, his face inscrutable — as if waiting for her to react.

She meets Kylo’s gaze for a moment. She had felt the tendrils of their shaken bond in the _Falcon_ as the Resistance barrelled to their temporary home after Crait. One time it was brief tension over her forearm, asking her to wait when she was walking to the fresher. Another time it was fingertips against her cheek, a brush of contact flicking a tendril of hair away when she lay in her bunk during her assigned sleeping shift. She did not see him then, but she felt him. She knows he’s been waiting for her to let her guard down just long enough to make a visual appearance.

But she does not want to see him. Not at all. She tells herself that her breath does not catch, that the laughter in the room does not dim when their eyes meet. That the beams of light coming through the window do not cut across Kylo’s uneven features, do not remind her of a brief darkness that they shared so shortly ago.

She tells herself he isn’t there at all, and looks back down to her caf. She will not give him the satisfaction of recognition. She laughs a little too loudly at Rose’s joke and reaches for one of the portions in the middle of the circle created by she, Finn, and Rose sitting cross-legged on the floor.

When she looks back up he’s already gone.

— — —

When Rose leaves to check on when the Resistance members are expected for their next assembly with Leia, Finn’s eyes soften and he reaches out to touch Rey’s shoulder. “Hey, are you okay?”

“What do you mean?” She thinks she kept her jawline straight so admirably, but perhaps she gave away more than she realizes. She leans back, away from Finn’s touch.

“Just now. I thought I saw you… like you saw something.”

Rey’s brows furrow and she looks to her trousers, fingers fiddling with a loose string unraveling from the gray fabric. She bites the inside of her cheek and recalls when she told Finn what really happened on Ahch-To. It had all poured out on the Resistance’s second night on Kashyyyk, when Rey & Finn encountered one another wandering the rope bridges hung between the treetops and unable to sleep. His mind was racing with thoughts about the plucky Rose Tico. Rey’s thoughts were consumed with how she had been so wrong about a vision that had seemed so real. The planet’s three moons slid up, over, and back beneath the horizon as she and Finn poured their hearts to one another, feet dangling over the edges of a bridge. She decided she was absolutely furious with Kylo and wanted nothing to do with him ever again. Finn decided that he had to win Rose’s heart after she had inspired him so, but had no idea where to start. They swore each other to total secrecy as they heard the camp start to stir around them and stood up when they saw BB8 approach.

Rey smiles at this memory and is brought back to the treehouse. “Was it really that obvious I saw something? And here I thought I was discreet.”

Finn tilts his head. “Not really. Wait. No. I don’t mean not discreet, I mean.... I guess it wasn’t that obvious. I don’t know if Rose saw.” He leans back on the floor of the treehouse. “Was it Ren?”

Rey lays down too, staring at the swirl of tree limbs that come to a single point in the ceiling. She hears a rustling of leaves. She tells herself she shouldn’t lie to her only friend, especially after the moment they shared only days ago.

“No. I thought it was him but… I’m not sure what I saw. I think maybe it was Luke trying to tell me something.” She hopes she sounds convincing.

Finn turns to look at her. “You promise you’d tell me if you were in trouble?”

“Of course.” Rey smiles. “I wouldn’t keep that from you.”

— — —

She thinks back to that night on the bridge with Finn again. She felt refreshed yet unmoored after they spoke. Finn awakened from his slumber after Starkiller to find new meaning and purpose after taking the chance to cast himself away from all that he knew. Found the “spark” to carry him through the uncertainty ahead, to hold on to that conviction he felt on Canto Bight with Rose after he had been so close to deserting the Resistance entirely. Rey envied his certainty when she felt so little of it after the initial rush of escape settled. She is left with potential abilities she does not understand still, with the choice to perpetuate or extinguish a thousands-years-old legacy. She flew to Ahch-To expecting to find a guide, only to be made an object of derision and to be told the Jedi path only leads to ruin. It casts a strange glow over Luke’s final acts on Crait, and Rey still isn’t entirely sure what to make of it. The group lauds his sacrifice as a heroic moment for the Resistance and Rey finds herself just wanting to know what he said to Kylo Ren. Out in the middle of the battlefield too far from the entrance for anyone to actually hear much, if anything at all.

This makes Rey consider everything else she has left out. Finally she could speak freely with Finn that night, she could provide details she excluded in earlier iterations without worrying about being overheard. Generally it seems to be assumed that Rey trained with Luke doing whatever it is Jedis do, and the pair showed up to take out Snoke and save them in response to their distress. No one has really asked for too many details yet, beyond her private debrief with Leia. And Rey has not offered them either.

As far as Rey can tell only Chewie, Leia, and Finn know the fuller picture of Luke’s rejection of the Force, her conviction that Kylo would turn, and that she was not the one to strike down Snoke. R2 too, maybe, but he has been asleep since his master passed. She knows that words tend to travel beyond intended destinations, but has not seen any signs of that yet. She did not tell Leia or Chewie the full extent of the bond. She said she found evidence of Kylo’s internal conflict during a few telepathic conversations, that she had her vision of taking down the praetorian guards during a moment of meditation. They know Kylo rejected her attempt to take him away from the First Order, but not that he asked her to stay. Finn knows about all those things she left missing. But she did not tell him that she saw Kylo once more after Snoke’s death and that she just saw him again.

She does not conceal these things with a specific intent to deceive — rather that these things are best left alone for now. Or felt too awkward to discuss with Kylo’s mother. But as for what really happened the night Kylo destroyed Luke’s temple, Rey determines that some things are better left unsaid. If anyone beyond her is unaware, it will never be her to inform them.

— — —

Rey doesn’t see Kylo again until a couple days later. She stands several yards from the main nexus of the Resistance camp, twirling her staff in mostly aimless maneuvers. She considers this strange place that she has come to, the circumstances here before it became their current lot.

The copse of trees that makes up their camp is intertwined with rope bridges that loom above her. The wide teardrop leaves come in three shades of green that grow in small bunches, crowding together on branches and creating crinkling noises in strong gusts of wind. Sets of wooden staircases spiral around four of the trees to the ground below into a broken circle of matted land that still looks walked upon despite reported years of disuse.

Rey estimates that the settlement is built to hold fifty guests, but it’s unclear how many were there before it was abandoned. Chewie told her the encampment had been a hunting lodge, where groups of wookiees stayed for a stretch of days to track the surrounding grounds. Despite its favorable geography, he doubted it ever ran at full capacity due to local legends of the Black Forest that began its reign at their boundaries. Explained that the Ashmead’s Lock crash site is not far from here and rumor has it the whispers of the prisoners roll through the moonlit breezes, punctuated by the metallic jangles of their bound chains. But the lodge itself, this new hideout, was abandoned only ten years before their arrival.

Their camp is in the middle of a small clearing, flanked by a forest with thicker growth of identical trees to the south. A worn trail winds its way towards Kachirho and other pockets of local population. To the east the clearing goes out further, running up into the staggered beginning line of mountainous crags and stony elevations. The trees in their copse are on the short side, at least compared to the soaring wroshyrs that stand to the north and west that begin the barrier to the sparsely-settled old growth forest. The thick trunks run hundreds of feet up into rich canopies of almost-black green leaves and the shadowed forest floor is cast in a stillness of perpetual gloaming. Chewie does not stay with the Resistance while on his home planet. Rey overhears him urge Leia to let him find them a better location, but the General does not want to attract attention so shortly after arriving.

(Rey doesn’t understand the hesitance in settling where others have taken their final breaths. She crawled through sandy graveyards for most of her life, found peaceful sleep in many places where bodies turned to ash. These stories do not concern her. And they had not concerned Leia either, who took no issue seeking temporary refuge in a place where they would be left alone to regroup.)

Only a few of them are appointed to make occasional rounds to Kachirho for supplies and intel as to not make their settlement too obvious, but Rey has already seen an unassigned tech saunter down the trail. Some members take advantage of the environment to go hunting, and between fresh meat & rations they’ve been well-fed so far. But she’s noticed that many brave the staircases to come down to the central camp, which held the remains of a stone firepit and sun-bleached furniture when they arrived. Thankfully the stairs are less questionable than they appear. Despite the inconvenience, there’s a certain uneasiness in the treehouses themselves that brings people down to explore the natural landscape. 

Which likely has much to do with the state of affairs when they arrived. Two of the common areas were filled with furnishings from other rooms, crowded into a labyrinthe mess that they all picked from for seating in their living quarters. Many places are weather-damaged. Some of the bedrooms had all the furniture removed, even the built-in bedframes had been ripped from the walls. A couple had broken floors. One contained a striking amount of splintered bookshelves destroyed in a fit of rage or something else. Whoever did it had the place of mind to put it all into a pile in the middle of the room afterwards, stacked almost to the ceiling. They did not clear it out.

Due to the restricted number of easily-habitable spaces available they’ve mostly ended up two to a double room, save for Leia, General Ematt, Commander D’Acy, and Poe Dameron who stay in single rooms. There’s one more single room available but no one stays on account of the scratch marks all around the sleeping area. The double room treehouses are large enough, comfortable enough to fit two wookiees in close quarters built purely for their utilitarian value of sleeping before a morning’s quest. The mattresses aren’t quite large enough for the frames. There’s a relay base containing some older communications systems. It’s already equipped with a mess hall, they only need to stand up three overturned tables. But almost everywhere else lays bare. Even the sitting room has but one bookshelf and a pile of about twenty books, though the discolored floors suggest footprints of many more shelves being present before. It’s assumed they became the pile in that one sleeping area.

For these reasons and others, Rey hasn’t quite settled in yet — she’s not sure anyone else has either. She stands in the clearing to the east and takes account of her forms, making sense of her footing as her gaze is drawn to the yawning twilight in the winding spaces between the wroshyr trees of the Black Forest.

She uses a staff because she hasn’t figured out how to fix the saber. She can barely read the purloined Jedi texts — they’re not in Galactic Basic. The few diagrams enclosed within their pages have more to do with swells of color than weaponry. She supposes there’s some meaning to be found in the shades of gray, but has not had the determination to try and interpret anything quite yet. 

She finds it difficult to focus on much aside from how absurd her life has become. And, truly, that’s how it feels to her. Utterly absurd. Of course she had dreams on the sandy floors of her AT-AT out on Jakku — none of them could have prepared her for the loneliness of getting everything she ever wanted.

_This is what you wanted, isn’t it?_ She asks herself this question at least twice a day. _To leave that forsaken planet. To have friends. To have a purpose beyond anything you could have imagined._

She is used long stretches of loneliness tempered by fleeting moments of brief companionship with other Jakku captives. She is not used to the strained smiles and small talk involved in getting to know so many near strangers at once. Finn is her anchor, her reminder that she’s not the only newcomer in this terrain. Rose Tico is kind and welcoming, though Rey perceives some hesitance in some other Resistance members. Poe is consistent in his attempts to get her to open up, and she tells herself she’s imagining things when his eyes linger just too long on her form. Leia gives her the confidence that Rey’s picked the correct side in this battle she never expected to be a part of, but she does not have the same connection to her as the others do. Purely an element of time, as opposed to intention, Rey remembers. It takes time to grow into somewhere new.

It’s no fault of any of these individual players, really. Rey tells herself her distance is her fault alone. It’s not as if they haven’t tried to bring her in.

And when she twirls her staff around behind her and hits Kylo Ren on the forearm, she does not want to close this distance either. She hears a definitive _thwak_ of wood against fabric  & solid flesh, but he does not flinch.

She wonders if he’s being sarcastic when he merely says, “Excuse me.” Like she had cut ahead of him in Plutt’s queue rather than hitting him with the staff.

Rey staggers back several steps. Comports herself. Shakes her head and regains her footing. She is mindful of her posture, making sure to stand as straight as possible when she responds. 

“You’re not excused.” No, that sounds silly. She tries again. “There is no excuse for you.”

“I see.” Kylo looks up, as if searching for something behind her. “It’s strange.” He looks back to her face. “I can feel you’re in a place filled with light but can’t see your surroundings still.”

Rey glances back over her shoulder. She sees Kaydel Ko Connix and What’s-His-Face with a map between them at the camp, but no one else. (Rose told her the name at least six times and now it’s too far gone to ask again.) They’re too engrossed in their conversation to notice Rey clenching her fists around her staff and speaking to the air.

“Don’t fret.” Kylo’s murmur breaks her train of thought. She turns back to him. “Whoever is there can’t see me. I can’t see them either.”

Rey wants to yell. She wants to make the boundary clear. But she can’t risk being noticed.

“I gave you a chance. You made your choice.” Rey spits at the ground, pleased to see it glob onto his shoe. He’s still looking at it when she hisses, “I don’t ever want to see you.” She glares and enunciates every syllable as she reiterates, “Leave. I don’t want to see you ever again _Kylo Ren._ ”

He looks up at that. Perhaps he expects her to continue calling him Ben. Too bad. Rey completes one more circle, satisfied to hear the staff crack against his shin. This time he flinches. She turns on her heels and returns to camp.

Rey meant it when she said it. She doesn’t want to see him ever again.

— — —

The next day she sees him (“literally the next day” she groans internally) when she’s only in her breastband and leggings, in a state of half-dress as she reaches out for a wrap to bring over her shoulders. His hands are behind his back, as if overly mindful of where he stands, perhaps in close quarters with others. Their eyes meet when she peers up from the green fabric. He stands before the window, and though she is certain he was not moving before it’s as if he’s been frozen mid-motion.

Rose is there too. Rey glances to see her roommate in her own state of semi-nakedness as the two women stand with their backs to each other as they begin the day. The two only have several feet and averted gazes to offer for privacy in the mornings and she’s not about to startle her topless roommate by suddenly turning about. Rey’s stomach lurches at the realization that she’s violated Rose’s privacy by bringing Kylo here before she remembers he says he cannot see Rose anyway.

He _can’t_ see her right?

_At least I’m mostly dressed,_ Rey tells herself as consolation for feeling too self-conscious to turn around and inadvertently reveal this transgression. Even if it’s a transgression more in theory than in fact.

It’s only for a few seconds that Kylo sees Rey’s bare stomach and plane of chest between collarbone & sternum, but it feels like years. She hardens her eyes consciously, hoping it’s soured her expression enough to make it obvious that he is not welcome to observe this intimate insight into her routine. Even though she knows neither of them can control it. Not really.

At least not yet.

He shifts his weight on his feet and looks to something at Rey’s left side, like he remembers he’s supposed to have his attention tuned in another direction.

_We’re even now,_ she deadpans in her inner monologue. Last time she had been the one to intrude upon him in a similar state.

Rey looks down to her hands knotting the loose ties of her shirt as she hears Rose rustling behind her. She reaches forward to unravel the bundles of her arm wraps, stretches her left arm out as her right hand loops around the band.

Something in the air breaks when Rose lets out an “oh” (apparently there was something she forgot to mention before). Rey looks up to see the window no longer obscured. Kylo is gone, and Rey is left looking upon the sea of leaves before her. She notes the sighing sway of one of the rope bridges off to the right.

— — —

Rey isn’t quite sure why she feels guilty for Kylo seeing something he did not even see, but makes a dedicated effort to drag down the trail of goosebumps along her forearm before he even has a chance to appear. The thought of inadvertently exposing Rose inspires Rey to cut him off even more.

Rey severed the connection as she boarded the _Millennium Falcon_ after Crait. Surely she can do it again. And she does it again admirably, she thinks. It doesn’t stop him from showing up, but some seconds of manifestation is an excellent improvement over minutes-long spans.

He’s wise enough not to speak to her, Rey knows exactly what she would say if he tries to talk again and none of it is kind. There is too much to do to waste any more time on him, to be reeled into “his lonely nonsense” (per the way she described it to Finn that one night). Kylo has no real concept of what loneliness truly means. Perhaps he did see the little island when she was strapped to the chair; it was the refuge and harbor for her dreams on desert evenings when the crisp night air bit through her two threadbare blankets. When the only sounds were distant footsteps of oversized creatures, and the dim echoes of another scavenger’s speeder signalling a start of nocturnal gatherings. The doppler effect reminded her of a long yawn back then.

But seeing is not the same as feeling for years upon years on end. She looks back at their interactions on Ahch-To with a sheen of resentment, mostly at herself for exposing vulnerability to someone who didn’t deserve it.

This passes for some days, where Kylo pops in and Rey makes a point of popping a pin into the bond instead. That time she was training with Finn. And the time surveying the camp perimeter. Another time while hiking with Chewie. The most inopportune time being when Kylo has the nerve to apparate in the middle of a rope bridge, squarely between herself and her friends on the other side. She shifts from the right to the left side of the bridge, smiling to Poe & What’s-His-Face while stepping around Kylo. She hopes neither notices this unaccountable path change.

(She debates with her lesser self that maybe she should try to nudge the man to give her his name and avoid eventual embarrassment. But the idea of hindering What’s-His-Face’s agency for such a small purpose makes her uneasy. He’s supposed to be a friend after all.)

It all goes swimmingly. If Finn or Rose or any other Resistance members notice anything “off” they don’t say anything to Rey. She stands in the back of the room at one assembly with Leia and tells herself she’s just imagining things when she thinks Leia keeps looking at her unncessarily.

Finn had advised Rey of how Leia used the Force after being expelled from the _Raddus._ But Rey doesn’t feel an aire of certain knowledge in the woman’s glances and chalks it up to paranoia. No one makes it obvious if anything has been figured out, so Rey assumes her secret is safe. She figures before long she’ll not only be able to sever the connection, but prevent the connection. Even cut off the bond entirely.

And will no longer have to worry about accidentally blurting out the Resistance’s location to the _Supreme Leader_ she helped to install.

— — —

She has not dreamed about Tanner in a long time. Perhaps the last time was a few months before BB8 rolled up in the sand and set this stage of her life in motion. It’s been a little over two years since she last saw him. There were not a whole lot of opportunities to make real connections on Jakku, but their eight months of stolen moments when Tanner made his rounds every few weeks through Niima Outpost was the closest she had gotten to making her way off the planet’s surface.

His last words to her always made an appearance in these sleepy memories. Finally he had stashed away enough credits to buy her freedom from Unkar Plutt, or at least he should have enough after securing this bounty. She used to remember who they were looking for and the prize. Tanner was in the shipping business, not hunting, but it was a favor for a dear friend who would pay handsomely for the trouble of assisting him. Now those circumstances have been distilled to those last words before his speeder became a droplet on the horizon...

He put his hand on her cheek and Rey looked up into his light blue eyes. They stood in sharp contrast to his olive skin, the mess of brown hair that he never patted down after taking off his helmet. He planned to return in two weeks and take her to his small home in Concordia, then they would “figure it out from there.” Rey wonders sometimes, in hindsight, whether she was enamored of him or the idea of not being owned by another.

Sometimes she wonders if leaving with Tanner would have meant being owned by him instead. This other potential has been her shield against remembering him too wistfully, especially when the end was fresh. She was seventeen and he only twenty-two, it’s easy to be swept into utopian assumptions when there’s so much time ahead to disappoint one another.

Nonetheless she wishes she could remember the contours of his face as clearly as she once did, but she does not forget his voice when he said his final words to her, _”I’ll come back, sweetheart. I promise.”_

A week later she overheard gossip at the Outpost and the call letters for a particular ship that was shot down near Jedha’s orbit. All the occupants presumed deceased as it had burst into flames as it hit the planet’s atmosphere. Plutt was frustrated as one of his regular contacts went down with it, what was he going to do with these engine components if Tanner Pavish went and got himself killed —

But this time she wasn’t dreaming about that moment when her heart shattered, but rather when it felt as if it would burst. That last time he’d filled her completely, not too long before their final goodbye. Their clothes were discarded on her bedroll, Tanner sat with his back against one of the interior walls of her AT-AT. She straddled on top of him, her forehead up against his as she held his shaft between them; bringing her hand up & down in that fluid motion that makes him exhale hotly into the corner of her neck. She grinds herself against his bare leg and her stomach up against him as she does, pressing her lips against his and feeling him bite down on her lower lip.

She pulls back a moment to look into his half lidded eyes, all too aware of how warm her center feels so close to him. He can feel her wetness on his skin and his fingertips trace over her moving hips, which dust up specks of sand that settle on her thighs and on the ground beneath them.

The sand. It gets everywhere.

His hands come up over her chest and squeeze down on her breasts as their eyes lock on the other, she moves up without breaking her gaze and with one hand she balances herself while the other lines up his cock between her folds. And she sinks down upon him and leans forward, a soft moan escaping into the skin of his shoulder while her forehead rests against the metal wall. She rocks upon him slowly, her breath catching as she stretches around him, working to settle into a rhythm that has them both trying to muffle the sounds they make.

Then something snaps between them, like even then something was trying to tell her that this time would be their last. Because they do away with the modesty of keeping down, and she feels a heated tension rise beneath her navel when he fills her to the hilt. She imagines her moans carrying over the lonely desert, rolling up the grains of sand into sparkling bits of dust. She rides him almost furiously, he says her name as he feels himself getting closer. She tightens her walls around him as he rises up within her, he thrusts up beneath her to meet her movements and presses up against that clutch of flesh within her. She’s loud when she finally reaches her crest, and her fingertips dig into his back when he unloads in her but this time she shudders when her name tumbles from his lips at a decidedly lower octave.

Rey leans back and looks down to where they join before she looks back up to Tanner’s face, but his hair is darker and longer. His skin more pale. His features click into place and she gazes upon the scar that cuts over his cheek down to his chest. That’s when she feels her cheeks flush as she becomes aware of whose face she gazes into —

— — —

Her eyes open and she’s staring at the dark ceiling of her treehouse. The moons are low in the sky, cutting thin beams of light over the wood. She feels the heat between her thighs magnifying the slick of her wet underwear. She instinctively looks to her left, surprised to find Rose’s bed empty. Perhaps she sneaked out to go see Finn. Rey’s hand begins to travel down from her stomach to the band of her sleeping shorts. She doesn’t care much for where Rose went as long as she’s alone.

When was the last time she had the opportunity to do this, she wonders while idly beginning to ghost over the nub of her clit. Not since she was on Jakku, she realizes. There was that one night on Ahch-To where she had desperately wanted to, but she had been too afraid of Luke picking up on it through the Force somehow. She didn’t know if it was possible, but the thought was insistent enough to quiet her nerves with the cool sea breeze. And now she is alone.

Rey closes her eyes as she dips a finger within herself to test her slickness and reminds herself she’s thinking about Tanner (“you’re thinking about Tanner”) when she feels her elbow brush up against a form on her right side. She stops and her stomach sinks as she feels a weight shift beside her on the bed. She glides her finger out hastily and lays her hand back on her stomach before looking to her right.

Kylo Ren lays between her and the treehouse wall. In her bed, beside her, looking roused awake as well. The air leaves the room when their gazes meet, when Rey becomes acutely aware that he’s woken up with an erection and she can feel the tip of his cock grazing against her thigh.

He’s never appeared this close to her before. Her bed feels small and his form is wide and imperceptibly his body cinches closer to hers. They can feel the other through the bond still after all. But there’s a certain detachment in the touch, as if he’s pressure against her form instead of the rugged roughness of a truly present figure. She can brush the texture of his sleeping shirt, but the cotton lines are absent between her fingers. When his fingers brush away a lock of hair over her cheek it’s like a brush of air settling it over her ear.

Instead of shutting down, instead of feeling startled, Rey feels her core start to heat up more. She knows she’s wet and the desire doesn’t stop building up between her hips, she wanted to touch herself so badly before and she’d finally be alone if not for —

It occurs to her that the time in her dream was the last time she had someone between her legs. The last time she had someone that close to her at all. It’s been two years since she’s had sex and now The Force has dropped a man into her bed. Literally.

She’s not sure who moves first, but she ignores that whisper in her ear (“don’t”) when she presses her hand on Kylo’s chest and draws her lips onto his. He kisses her back roughly, taking his arm around her and his hand presses into her back bringing her closer to him. Like in her dream, he drags his teeth over her bottom lip and rests a hand on her cheek when he deepens the kiss.

She notices a correlation between Kylo’s movements and a shivered whisper that creeps underneath her skin. She feels parallel sensations that appear uncoupled from their causes, the feathering of flesh on her fingertips when Kylo’s touch her. A mirrored roving of another’s tongue within and upon her own when they kiss. She’s unsure whether it’s pleasurable or unnerving, but the novelty is too much to ignore. She switches between chasing the newness and looking for patterns in the stuttered instability of the bond. The multiplicity is punctuated by half seconds of nothingness here and there, all tactile sensation turning off and on again. That’s when she realizes she does not feel the hushed ricochet when she touches his clothing.

_What are you doing, Rey_ her conscience tries to say.

He leans back from her when her hand drags down between them, rubbing over the bulge between his legs. His eyes look into hers trying to discern whether this is some sort of game when she presses her palm against him and creeps her fingers back up and over the waistband of his pants. She takes his length in her hand and starts to stroke up and down feeling him build up in her grasp. She realizes the shudder she feels between her own legs is concurrent, even immediate.

His hands migrate over to her as well, each palm large enough to completely cover her small tits. He grasps them firmly for a moment, feeling the mounds of flesh bunch up in his grasp but his hands feel far away from her even as his left hand rubs circles over her nipple. His right hand dips into her shorts and she sees his mouth fall open when he presses two fingers inside her. He thrusts them in and out and through the bond she senses the slickness he feels around them despite being lightyears apart.

He applies pressure with the bottom of his hand on her chest and the thumb of his right hand presses down and flicks over her clit. She feels him rubbing her furiously, the bundle under his thumb swelling beneath it as his fingers drag forward and back. Her cheeks are hot as she ruts back against his hand, she can’t tell if it’s the heat of the connection or the shame of his identity. He dips his thumb into her and she can’t feel the roughness of his thumbpad when it drags against her clit again, spreading the slickness over it. She stops them both a moment to push her fingers into her entrance and Kylo groans when she brings them back to rub her wetness along his length. His own hands resume with a renewed hardness and determination.

He thrusts his own hips up into her hand as she keeps her wrist moving, which jars the steady movements over his cock as the pace quickens. Both of them so close to feeling the other that’s not truly there with them, in a bed on the other side of the galaxy. The distance unravels between them and their hands, and her breaths become quicker and more ragged as she realizes she can feel him as she feels herself when their skin touches in the bond. His fingers stretch her open and press down on her nerves at the same time she feels the tightness of her grasp on him as a tension clenching up around those digits. She can feel what she does to him at the same time he does to her. The connection can’t seem to weave through, and despite the detached dimness of the mirrored sensation it takes her own felt stimulation to a new level.

Fooling around has never felt like this before, being so within and so without the other at the same time. She’s mindful to keep her voice down, moaning softly as she buries her face against him.

But she ignores herself as she feels the tension build up within her, her cunt a sloppy mess around his hand, his cock twitching in her grasp and he drags her closer and closer to the brink. How much she wants it almost hurts, she stops herself from asking him to pause, and after several more cycles of huffing against his hand she feels the string break. She groans a little too loudly she thinks and tightens up against him as she comes, muffling herself against his chest. She forces herself not to breathe his name, but he does say hers as he topples over his own edge. She closes her eyes and hot liquid trails down her hand, but when she opens her eyes he is gone and the bedspread is clean of his cum but not of hers.

Almost as if he wasn’t there at all.

Rey looks over to Rose’s empty bed and it takes several minutes to slow her breathing and racing thoughts enough to drift into sleep.

_What are you doing, Rey_


	2. Chapter 2

Rose tries to act as if she slept in the treehouse all night and Rey doesn’t let on that she knows otherwise. They face away from one another as they dress in the morning and there’s a certain hollow feeling in Rey’s chest that feels like it’s crawling down her arms. All her thoughts of the prior night’s events feel intrusive and contradictory, all coming to a spark of curiosity dampened by the recognition that she’s made a very poor decision. She should have closed the connection and returned to her business without the assistance of a second set of hands. She should not have succumbed to her baser desires, especially with _him_ of all creatures.

Rey chalks up her lapse in judgment to Kylo being in the right place at the right time. He happened to be there when she woke from a particularly vivid dream, the nighttime hour lending itself to hasty conclusions that would not have been made otherwise. She considers the complications she’s presented herself unncessarily — they may have been placed together by their bond but _she_ was the one to move first. And she’s certain he will ask her about it the next time he appears. 

Rey’s thoughts are disrupted by Rose’s question. “We have meeting again today?”

Rey smooths down her breastband and pauses a moment. “I think so.”

“Hope General Organa tells us we’re finally leaving this place.” Rey pulls her shirt over as Rose continues. “To somewhere with more freshers. Less creepy woods.”

Rey turns to face her as she wraps her arm bands on. “I think the forests are beautiful.” She directs her gaze to her forearms as the cloth circles up, feeling unable to look Rose in the eye. “Never seen anything like it. Except maybe in a dream.” Rey smiles at this, but she isn’t sure why.

“Oh. Right. Desert planet. Glad one of us likes it.” Rose moves to look under her bed then strides to the window. Her flurry of activity stops as she gazes out to the treetops and Rey doesn’t have to wait long to hear what’s on her mind. Rose continues to look out as she asks, “Does Finn ever talk about me?”

Rey isn’t sure how to answer at first. She knows Finn is infatuated with Rose, but Rey can’t determine whether it’s a matter of fact or a matter of circumstance. There’s nothing Rose has done to make her seem untrustworthy or off-putting, but Rey wonders briefly whether she would just take Finn’s heart to break it —

Rey doesn’t notice that she physically shakes her head when she casts off the thought. She has no place interrupting a friend’s potential happiness. “Yes, he has. Fondly.”

Rose tries to stop a laugh that comes out anyway. Rey can’t tell what’s amusing, but Rose continues. “Put in a good word for me?”

“Of course.” She forces a grin before biting the inside of her cheek and isn’t sure why she feels so surrounded.

— — —

Rey has perimeter shift this morning and walks the predetermined route checking the traps, picking up a couple wrappers, and looking for inexplicable footsteps or disturbances. She finds her thoughts wandering back to the moment she realized that interacting through her force bond with Kylo was very different than she anticipated.

She doesn’t understand how this never came up before, but determines that the opportunity never actually arose until now. Any other instance of physical contact has been when the other was actually there. Or when he was wearing gloves. When she hit him on Kashyyyk, it had been with her staff. The only other time was when she reached out on Ahch-To and in hindsight she’s sure she felt it then too.

She’s steadfast in her position that last night was a mistake not to be repeated. And yet she keeps circling back to how far their bond can be pressed, and what the shared sensations would feel like during other exercises — Each time she cuts herself off before allowing the fantasy to go any farther, tells herself the warmth it prompts between her legs is the result of something akin to scientific discovery rather than anything else.

— — —

Rey crosses paths with Finn on her way towards the general assembly that afternoon and lets him lead the way. At first the Resistance met in the bookshelf-depleted sitting room, but it was too crowded for the 32 of them. The mess hall worked well enough by Rey’s standards, but perhaps it didn’t feel official enough to the others. They ended up constructing a meeting spot at the base of a tree with a wide artificial opening that stands to the southeast of the camp at the edge of the clearing. They brought logs over to form a circular seating area and Rey helped to build the fire pit in the middle. Rey takes a seat next to Finn as the others gather. Cova Nell sits on her other side and the two women nod in a silent greeting.

Leia sits in front of the opening in the tree at the head of the forming circle. She is flanked by Ematt and D’Acy; Poe sits on D’Acy’s other side. Unaccustomed to the rigidity of military discipline, Rey finds it curious that the group continues to hold to its official rankings in spite of the dramatic change in circumstances. Even without the trappings of bases, weapons caches, or even ships they maintain a certain sense of order.

The quiet murmurs of conversation come to a halt when Leia clears her throat. Rey imagines the General counting in her head as her eyes flicker over each individual sitting before her. In this seating arrangement Rey can see everyone’s expressions and reminds herself not to settle too long on any particular one.

Leia begins. “We’ve made progress with our efforts in Mytaranor, they are working on arranging a meeting with their contact from Balamak — He’s been arming the insurgents attacking the First Order compounds out there and may be a local source of replacement weaponry.” Rey notices D’Acy shift the way she crosses her feet at the ankle. “But these are chiefly ground use and don’t place us any closer to where we need to be.” Leia points a single finger skyward as she says it.

Ematt chimes in, continuing the thought. “Chewbacca has put us in touch with some locals who may get us a few steps closer to securing light craft. Threnalli & Kuchimba have approached us with some other potential contacts as well.” He looks to the mentioned pair in silent recognition and presses forward. “We need to have a good show of resources if we hope to convince any benefactors to put us in a cruiser.”

Rey sees a smile peek across Poe’s face that quickly dissipates as Leia continues her remarks, “We’ve reached out to locations that have not pledged fealty to the First Order, but most of what’s left of the New Republic is still reeling from losing their top brass when the Hosnian system —“ Leia clears her throat again and Ematt nods. “But whatever the First Order official statements may _say_ we have good reason to believe they’re reeling just as much from losing Snoke.”

Commander D’Acy takes over. “We’ve received a handful of… delayed responses to our distress signal on Crait. It’s public knowledge that our numbers have been decimated, that Kylo Ren has declared himself Supreme Leader of the First Order, but what’s interesting is what _hasn’t_ been said.” Rey idly wonders if anyone notices the change in how Rey crosses her arms, suddenly overly conscious of her posture in the circle. She looks back up to D’Acy. “Still no announcement of a flagship, even though we took out the _Supremacy_ and we know they have the resources. No major movements of destroyers as far as we can see —“

“Which reminds me,” Leia asks. “Where are we with the in-house communications systems and tracking?”

She turns to Connix, who adjusts her posture under the General’s gaze. “We’ve upped the ranges beyond the local systems to most of this portion of the Mid Rim, with a few more refur —“

This is where Poe cuts in. “In-house is great, but this is temporary.” He seems to take account of the crowd, glancing back to the treehouses briefly when he does. “No place for a long-term base, it was tricky enough finding a space for that freighter back there.” Poe gestures towards the Black Forest as he speaks. “Where are we going next?”

Rey notices something deflate in his expression when Leia raises an eyebrow and responds flatly. “We have a short list of locations, some that require more logistics than others.” It’s said in a manner that makes it clear that’s all that will be said on specifics. “Until then we will improve on what we have here, we will not be sitting in the woods playing sabacc all day.”

Ematt elaborates. “There’s also a matter of transport, we’re lucky that freighter got us all here in one piece, isn’t that right Rey?”

She doesn’t expect to be brought into the conversation, still without any official designation from the Resistance. “Right,” she echoes.

D’Acy starts up again. “No major movements of First Order ships and no major announcements, General Hux is unusually silent — We don’t know the full extent of the fallout after Snoke’s death.” She looks to Rey as she says it. “The most important thing is no new movements in our direct range. Aside from, ah, the weekly trade route passcodes and the rest, there have been some notable updates to the bounty list.”

“Have they upped mine yet?” Poe asks with a chuckle.

D’Acy ignores him. “They have the same list in place that’s been there for years, with two exceptions — Finn.” He looks up from his hands with his full attention to the commander. “Your bounty increased to the same level as the General here.”

The man sitting on Finn’s other side punches his shoulder to congratulate him. Rey is fairly certain his name is Sharp, but they’ve never spoke one-on-one. 

“And Rey.” This time Rey tries to look into D’Acy’s eyes. “You’ve been added to the list. They’re offering a prize large enough to sway a potential ally. You may want to be careful of when and where you show your face.”

It’s sound advice, but Rey can’t help but feel ruffled. She didn’t ask for it. There’s an edge to the sentence that clarifies it’s not just a suggestion.

“How large are we talking?” Minneau asks. Rey shared a shift with him at the relay tower once.

“Twice as much as Leia if — Five times as much if she’s brought to them alive.” D’Acy clears her throat as several members cheer. “Rey of Jakku, the Last Jedi, for the death of Supreme Leader Snoke.”

Cova Nell elbows Rey’s arm in a show of support. “That’s our girl.”

Rey isn’t sure what to do besides smile sheepishly. The bounty is being treated as an accomplishment by some, but Rey notices those who cannot meet her gaze and seem to look away with some sense of trepidation. She is struck by the recognition that she’s an enormous liability for the rest of the group — and that a bounty that large would not have been posted without the current Supreme Leader’s approval.

Kylo Ren signed her death warrant and tried to shoot the _Falcon_ out of the sky and she repaid the favor by entertaining him in her bed. Rey reminds herself not to clench her jaw. 

Leia claps her hands as she begins to speak again and all attention returns to her. “But we’re still where we were when we got here. We need ships, weapons, a base, and _numbers._ ” She pauses, as if conducting another headcount. “And given how few we have we need anyone with any ideas to volunteer them.”

It occurs to Rey that this is the first assembly to address the matter so frankly. Both Leia and D’Acy made plain what no one else has said aloud quite yet — they went from over 400 individuals evacuating D’Qar to the 32 of them left on Kashyyyk. And that includes the droids. But Leia’s request for input does not come off as a sign of weakness to Rey, more of a signal towards an open door. Nonetheless the group remains silent. Poe visibly shifts before taking the opportunity to speak. “I can get us about four ships out of Uyter, but we need to provide all the raw materials.”

Leia raises an eyebrow. “You expect us to all go mining, Dameron?”

“You asked for ideas.”

“It’s an idea I’ll give you that.” Leia chuckles. It’s unclear whether she’s taking it seriously when she asks, “And have you considered the time element involved?”

Rey keeps her palms down on her thighs, pressing her fingertips down to make absent shapes. She’s aware of the words being said but has trouble relieving the tension from her jaw, that feeling of being seen when no eyes are trained in her direction.

Rey looks over to Connix as the woman speaks aloud. “We wouldn’t be able to obtain the authorizations to dig here in Kashyyyk, but I —“ Connix’s lips cover her teeth when she sees all attention turned to her. “I know someone. Who provides permits on an unclaimed asteroid, it’s a few clicks from the border of the hyperspace channel that cuts east-west between here and Concordia.”

Heh. Rey smiles to herself. Concordia. She never did know where it was.

“How do you know him?” Leia may be entertaining this idea. Rey doesn’t ask if anyone looked at picking through the abandoned mines here or even on Mytaranor. The scavenger in her is certain the long gone wookiee slaves hadn’t picked out every ore available to The Empire.

Connix continues. “We grew up together. I don’t… I don’t know if he’d be particularly sympathetic to the Resistance, but he’s not the type to turn down credits.”

Leia furrows her brows. “So you don’t really know what we’d be getting into.”

“I — I suppose not, General.”

Poe cuts in. “Well, that’s one idea. We have an executable goal, a way to go about attaining it, and —“

This is where Rey finds herself losing the tether that keeps her attention on the words being spoken around her. She does her own headcount to confirm and can still hardly believe how few people appeared when she lifted the rocks of their stony prison in Crait. She thought there would be so many more to come home to, if this is the closest thing she has to a home right now. She was sleeping on Jakku only a few weeks ago. She thought Ahch-To would be her new home, her haven to unlock this strange spindling energy she still doesn’t understand. But Luke is gone — she imagines the planet barren in his absence — and Finn was the one home she could find. There was nowhere else for her to go.

Rey considers that she should have spoken up before, asked about access to abandoned mines, but the natural moment has passed and she’s hesitant to divert the existing conversation. She can say something to Leia or Poe after the group disperses.

She hears Poe say her name. “ — and have Rey cover us when it’s time to meet face-to-face. Use some of that Force magic to keep things running smoothly.”

_That’s not how The Force works._

Leia is quiet for a moment. “I’m sure our Jedi would enjoy the opportunity to go off-world with you, but we have that bounty to consider and right now is not the ideal time.” She looks to Rey and smiles. Rey notes that it’s an honest smile, weightless with a glint of mischief. Maybe she’s not serious about Poe’s suggestion after all. There’s a slight pressure on Rey’s left temple for a breath, then nothing more.

What —

Leia claps her hands together. “Connix, reach out to your contact and use your best judgment. Try to get us a meeting on Uyter, check his wares and his fares.” Leia chuckles at her own rhyme. “Reconvene tomorrow. Prindel and Millham on perimeter, techs back to the Falcon and communications. One of you — ah, Rosetta — Riva, get us the shuttle schedule to Uyter.” She points to What’s-His-Face in his dirt-caked pilot fatigues. “You. Take Finn on your run to Kachirho and have him review any new announcements from the First Order with you.”

_Why won’t anyone call him by his name?!_

With the meeting adjourned, individuals begin to mill around to their various assignments. Rey places a hand on Finn’s arm as he rises and whispers, “Wait, come with me.” The pair waits for most of the group to disperse before standing, they walk together taking slow deliberate steps out of earshot of the others. Rey grasps Finn’s bicep to lead him off the path. She realizes how close he is to her and what it must look like to someone looking back.

“She asked about you,” Rey reveals. She makes a point of keeping her voice down. “Whatever you’re doing is working. She asked me to put a good word in for her.”

Finn blushes and doesn’t have to ask who Rey means. She lets go and takes a few steps away, goosebumps rising on her arms. It’s freeing to share gossip like they’re playing & camping in treehouses instead of hiding from an uncertain future. Rey isn’t sure why she chooses to tell him like this, as if trying to steal a moment of intimacy despite being within sight of others. She is distantly aware that she is overcompensating for that hanging thread of regret that keeps swaying in her chest.

“Thought you should know.” Rey jogs towards the treehouses, turning back a moment to smile at Finn when she does. She feels the air around her lift as if the bond has closed, and there’s a hardness in her throat when she realizes she didn’t notice it open in the first place.

— — —

Rey knows she felt the General try to nudge her mind open, trying to get a glance at its surface. Clearly Leia is stronger with the Force than she lets on.

Maybe she was trying to send a sign, a squeeze on the shoulder to show she is there for her too. That she’s not alone in trying to make sense of this energy that flows through them. Or maybe Leia is suspicious, was looking for a sign of something else.

Rey isn’t sure what to believe. She files the event away for later review. She doesn’t approach Leia later about the mines.

— — —

The next day passes without much event or consequence until late in the afternoon. Rey sits in the communications house with Rose and Connix as the two fiddle with signal magnifiers. She buffs marks out of the transmitters they plan to install after their update cycles through. Refurbishing comms is not her strong suit, but Rose was assigned here with Connix and she does not want to be alone. It’s not entirely Rose’s strong suit either, but none of them question why Leia would have the mechanics assist Connix instead of techs.

The women mostly talk shop as parts trade hands. They remark on the climate and the state of their living quarters. They wonder if any of them will be granted permission to go to Kachirho for an opportunity to leave the compound. Rose says she saw Sharp take the southern path the other day even though he’s not one of the designated runners. Connix has noticed that Namit and Cicer’s hikes into the Black Forest take longer and longer, they didn’t even show up to rations distributions last night. Rey suggests it’s probably because they shot something more tasty. They all agree that the best natural trail in the elevated region is the one that curls alongside the stream with the plank bridge. The conversations are friendly and superficial enough, but there’s no warmth of comfortable acquaintanceship in their tones.

There’s a knock of knuckles against wood and all three women look up to the entrance when Poe greets them. “Have us looking in the Unknown Regions yet?”

“Not quite,” Connix responds with a thin smile. “This booster should double our radius.” She glances to the shutdown radar screen. “But I’m not sure we can stretch it further than that.”

Poe comes closer to the group and sits beside Rey on the floor. “Why is that?”

“Because it’s not a subspace transceiver. These models were built for local monitoring and short-distance interactions. They’re missing basic components for long-range and that’s our wall.” Connix shrugs. “I don’t think this lodge really catered to anyone outside this system, maybe not even outside Kashyyyk.”

It’s a rehash of a conversation they had about an hour prior to Poe’s arrival. He asks the exact same question Rose did before, but in different words. “Any luck getting parts from Kachirho?”

“I gave the list to Leia last week, was supposed to hand it off to Ematt for when he went in.” Connix looks over to Rey and Rose, there’s a note of exasperation in her downturned lips. “But when he got back said she never gave it to him. Tried to hand him another copy myself but said I have to go back to her.” She pauses. “Keeps asking me about the communications but still won’t take my parts list.”

Poe shrugs. “Probably forgot. Give it to me, maybe I’ll have some luck in Uyter.” He reaches out a hand as if she has a literal copy available.

Rose raises an eyebrow. “You’re going to — You’re really going?”

“Yup.” Poe takes back the open palm and scratches his back. “The cycle after next.” He leans to the side to gain access to a higher spot and bumps an elbow against Rey. “Pardon me, Madam Jedi.” Rey narrows her eyes in feigned offense with a closed lip grin.

Rose turns to Connix. “Have you even heard back from your contact?”

“Not yet.” She opens a drawer to peek at her personal comlink and closes it again. “But I’m not sure the message is even getting out. It’s not properly connecting to the satellite.”

“Not just you,” Poe replies. “No confirmation from Black Squadron and I’ve pinged Snap and Jess plenty. Finn hasn’t been able to link up to Maz either.”

Rey has no faces to place with Snap & Jess’s names. But Poe told her and Finn about them at great length one night during their first week at camp over some unreasonably strong alcohol Poe got from one of Chewie’s friends when they came by the camp. Rey isn’t sure how he pulled it off with such a terrible understanding of Shyriiwook, but Poe & Finn drank happily and the stories got longer and more involved as the flask emptied. She barely sipped from it, was certain the drink was made sitting in a tub in the back of a forgotten storage, same thing Plutt did at the Outpost. She had worried that dulling her senses would open the connection to Kylo that evening and wasn’t in any mood.

A part of her hopes she’ll meet the tales’ characters someday, but knows they’re probably dead. Along with almost everyone else who is ever mentioned in reminisces of times past.

“So what are you even doing there then?” Rose asks.

“Meeting my guy.” Poe turns to look at Rey beside him. “And you’re coming with me, right?”

“D’Acy will have my head if I do.” Rey shakes her head and glances towards the entryway as if she may be heard. “Not to mention Leia.”

Connix leans back in her seat and crosses her arms. “You really enjoy making a habit out of contradicting the General, huh?”

Poe’s glare is playful when he tuts back. “Not a way to speak to your superior officer _Kaydel._ ”

She rolls her eyes. “I’m still surprised they have you in High Command at all.”

He gestures to the window, his other arm in a sweeping motion that seems to signal the larger compound in entirety. “May have been demoted, but I still outrank the rest of you. And I do recall a certain lieutenant standing by my side on the _Raddus_ —“

“Don’t remind me.” She interrupts him with a laugh. “Pretty sure Namit and Cicer will never get over it.”

Rey and Rose meet one another’s gaze. Rey scrunches her nose, a weak attempt to silently ask if Rose can feel that tension too — as if Connix is skirting around something she doesn’t want to say aloud. Rose responds by looking to Poe and back to Rey. She does it again and waggles her eyebrows with a wink.

“Have something to share, Tico?” Poe asks.

“Just that Rey should go see if any of Malla’s biscuits are left in storage.” Rose grins. “I could eat those wookiee cookies thirteen times a day.”

Rey welcomes the opportunity for a break. The company is pleasant but it’s still jarring at times to be around so many others at almost all times after so many years of relative solitude. She wipes her hands on her trousers despite her palms being clean and moves to stand. “Think anyone will be upset if I take two for each of us?”

“Maybe,” Poe answers. “Blame me. Say I gave you an order.”

— — —

Rey nods a greeting to those she passes on her way to the storage area, grazing her fingertips over the rope bridge railings as she crosses each expanse between the treetops. Most are worn down from weathering and years of prior use, though the occasional stray fiber pricks against her skin. She pauses in the middle of one bridge to look down onto the circle, sees Namit and Cicer cross below as they stroll towards the northern entrance to the Black Forest. She rarely sees them apart and wonders if they feel a similar sense of aimlessness no longer being under Holdo’s command.

She pauses on another bridge to look upon the eastern clearing. The stark contrast between the old-growth worshyrs and the bright greens of the southern forest is emphasized by the craggy rock formations on the horizon. The elevations remind her of scattered stone piles when their peaks are cleared of fog. The view never fails to strike her when observed at certain hours, particularly when the suns start to slide downward. She’s overheard plenty of individuals besides Rose refer to the woods with varying levels of dissatisfaction, but it outpaces the eternal sands of Jakku on every aesthetic scale.

Rey is mindful not to stray too long and finds the smaller storage, the Resistance having split supplies between two of the unoccupied treehouses. She assumes this area was used the same way when the lodge was operational, the walls are windowless and were fitted with lines of shelves with stacks of empty crates beneath them when they arrived. This is where Bollie Prindel infamously found the “busted blaster” that fired while he cleaned it less than two hours later at the ground circle. Thankfully it only left a mark in one of the tree’s trunks rather than a hole through someone’s flesh, but it earned the urodel the nickname “Marksman.” Rey is pretty sure it isn’t meant as a compliment.

She points to the shelves as she scans them for the biscuit tins, uncertain where they were left. Not seeing them here she lightly kicks the nearest crate. It barely moves, suggesting it’s filled with something more weighty than treats. With a sigh she kicks another crate, this one makes a skritching sound when it scrapes against the wooden floor and settles with a hopeful metallic clanging. Rey kneels before the crate and finds it latched shut. She doubt the biscuits would be kept under lock & key and rises to approach a cupboard they moved in here from another room.

With her back to the entrance, Rey bites her lip when she feels the room’s temperature change and hears the forest’s sounds dim. She curses aloud when patches of goosebumps raise on her arms and the familiar vacuum of Kylo’s arrival settles in the room. She closes her eyes and waits a moment, admitting to herself that she has no plan for what to say.

She turns around and there he stands as if he’s been waiting for her for years. Kylo wears his usual black uniform though his tunic is absent, making him look oddly casual. She assumes he must be alone given his state of dress but has no way to know.

He is the first one to speak. “I was wondering where I would see you again.”

Rey doesn’t know what she expected. But she did not expect that. She sees this observation as potentially useful and files it away for later review.

She responds by walking past him to the open door, she makes a conscious effort not to shut it too hard. There’s a tension in her shoulders that releases when she hears the latch slide in place. She wonders whether her internal sigh is audible when she makes an about-face to look back towards the room, both hands behind her back with one pressed against the door. She hopes if the exhalation was vocalized that it was as exasperated as she feels.

She starts to return to her former position in front of the cupboard but Kylo stops her before she can cross the room. His gloved hand reaches for her waist in an effort to impede her progress that bothers her in how successful it is. She lets him guide her to the door, her back leans against it with his hand upon her and she questions how she’s ended up this way despite no real push from him.

Kylo leans closer in and she drifts back to avoid his lips until she feels her tailbone & shoulders blades flush against the entryway. She insists that her heart has not skipped a beat when his other gloved hand reaches for her hip.

“No.”

He removes his hands when she says it and suddenly she’s aware of how close he is to her. He takes a step back and she straightens her posture in an attempt to appear as serious as possible. She feels a flutter rise in her chest despite the words she speaks, and knows how small she must appear looking up at him with her back to the door like this.

“Go away.”

She hopes it sounds more definitive than she feels. She does not work to sever the connection between them like she has before, does not know what to make of the contradictions that run through her still. The fantasy she crafted from her curiosity revitalizes from its dormant state now that he’s here before her again.

Kylo hardens his expression and Rey waits for that pressure of attempted intrusion she felt at the meeting the day prior. But it does not manifest and Rey is surprised he isn’t trying to probe beneath her words. His voice is softer than she expects too when he merely replies with “I see.”

She repeats what she said the first time they spoke on Kashyyyk. “I don’t want to see you ever again _Kylo Ren._ ” She nods to affirm her statement, but it’s not for his sake. “I have nothing to say to you.”

He smiles at that, but it’s not happy or full and Rey isn’t sure it even counts as a smile but does not know what else to call it. He seems more amused than anything, yet his tone remains serious when he says “You kiss your enemy and have nothing to say.”

She glares. “That was a mistake.” She is compelled to explain further even though she knows she does not need to do so. “An error in judgment.”

“Then why do it?”

Rey knows why she did it but does not want to admit it. She thinks back to the last night they spoke on Ahch-To and formulates an excuse that she hopes he will believe. 

“I was lonely.”

He leans forward and places a hand against the door near her head. Rey wonders if she’s up against a wall where he is, if she’s a bright form upon durasteel or cast in shadow. She looks up to meet his skeptical gaze and bites the inside of her cheek as she feels that tightness in her chest again.

“No, that’s not it.” She asks herself what signalled the falsehood — was it her tone, her body language, her eyes, or — “Say it, Rey.”

This time she tells the truth.

“I was horny.”

“Ah, there it is.”

He brings his other hand up to rest on her cheek and she feels the smoothness of leather against her skin but nothing more. He moves back to remove his glove and drop it; Rey sees it fall but it does not rest on the treehouse floor. She closes her eyes when his bare hand takes her cheek again and hates that she is unable to suppress a shudder when she recognizes the shared sensation.

“You’re not the least bit curious?”

Of course she is but she refuses to tell him

“Why be curious about someone who’s offering a prize for my corpse?”

Kylo takes his hand away. “That was Hux.”

She glares. “With _your_ approval I’m sure.”

There’s a beat of silence before he responds. “You expected me to deny such a request? And raise his suspicions? To what end?”

She looks away from him and trains her eyes to the wall on her right. She inhales sharply when he leans in close again and she feels the heat of his breath against her neck when he whispers in her ear. “Come to me, Rey.” For a moment she thinks he’ll press his lips against her throat, but instead she feels his fingers graze up her armbands and settle against the contraceptive implant in her upper arm. “I’ll see to it that you are unharmed.”

“No.”

She looks back to see him cast his eyes downward, as if he’s disappointed by her denial. He doesn’t say anything more when he steps back and looks upon her form. He glances back over his shoulder in response to something she cannot see and Rey shuts her eyes tight, works to sever the connection between them.

When she reopens them she is alone in the treehouse and she works to slow her racing pulse. She runs a hand through her hair, reminds herself she is here to locate Malla’s biscuits. She crosses the room to return to the cupboard and finds the tins inside.

— — —

Rey satisfies her curiosity with her hands that night when Rose is asleep. She stays quiet as she feels her desire build and finds it strange that the nighttime breeze seems to carry moans through the window that are not her own. But she imagines that they are hers and she imagines what it would be like to feel being inside herself. She remembers Kylo whispering in her ear and knows that the forest will keep her secrets.

She is disappointed when she doesn’t come nearly as hard as she did before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 3 is mostly written already, hope to have it up in the next week or two. Thank you for reading and you can find me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The forest starts to reveal its secrets to Rey...

At first Rey cannot determine whether she’s awake or not when she sees the flames overwhelm her field of vision. She reaches her hands forward to find no warmth and her flesh is left unconsumed by the fire. She watches the flames flicker over her skin in a wisping motion until she hears the pop of an ember being ejected from the blaze. It startles her from her reverie and Rey backs away. There’s another pop and this time she follows the path of a floating bit of ash as it rises above her. It folds in on itself as it spindles back down, a thin trail of smoke in its wake. It takes a moment to adjust her vision and she watches the flames organize into a coherent image. She staggers back to gain her bearings, but her movements are unanchored and she feels no surface beneath her feet.

There’s a brief sensation of falling forward as she hears a distant wail that distills into a lower and lower pitch, rolling downward until it settles into the guttural roar of —

A wookiee. He stands before a bonfire and there’s another crack as he tosses an object into the flames. She realizes they’re at the firepit at the main circle of the Resistance’s camp. She looks up as more embers crackle skyward to confirm that she sees the familiar treehouses above, now cast in an unsteady orange glow against the deep darkness of night. Yet the bonfire seems far too large to fit the firepit they found upon arriving. She squints a bit to see into the flames and is able to discern fluttering pages of papers.

The wookiee is burning a huge pile of books. His screams are unintelligible as he throws another onto the stack. They’re heaped _upon_ something Rey cannot see, it seems to bow beneath the weight of them as the flames grow higher. The wookiee keeps tossing more and more texts into the conflagration, shrieking nonsense that in no way resembles actual Shyriiwook. The sound echoes through the clearing, reverberates through Rey’s ribs.

She is not alarmed by the incorporeal hands that grasp her ankles and drag her to the ground. They take her gently and she sinks downward as soft unfamiliar whispers tumble into her ears. Rey watches as a bony limb unfurls limply from the bottom of the flames the wookiee tends, his roars blending into the first thing she can understand —

_”OUT!”_

— — —

Rey awakens in a cold sweat, her sleeping shirt sticking to her skin. She lays still, organizing her scattered thoughts into a self-soothing declaration. _A nightmare. You haven’t had one in awhile._ It is dark still and she trains her focus on one of the ceiling’s tree limbs, begins to count as she breathes in an effort to lull herself back to sleep. She closes her eyes to lose herself in the movements of her chest rising up  & down. The woods are silent save for the skittering of distant nocturnal creatures, the faint creaking of the nearest rope bridge swaying in the nighttime breeze, and the nearly imperceptible crackling of flames —

Wait.

She opens her eyes, keeping her gaze on the same tree limb as before and holding her breath to deepen the quiet of the room. The crackling continues, trickling through the open window. Rey sits up, looks over to see Rose sleeping soundly on her side. The woman coughs and rustles to shift position. The rope bridge swings more heavily and Rey swears she hears it whisper.

_Go see._

The survival instincts she honed on Jakku tell her to stay in the room, to keep firmly planted in the safety of this moonlit haven, to not respond to the biddings of unaccountable voices. And yet she rises to her feet and finds herself walking to the door, unable to yield to her more rational considerations. She tells herself she walks to the bridge in the spirit of justified inquiry. Perhaps someone fell asleep by a campfire, she needs to confirm it has not strayed from its intended place for the safety of the camp at large.

Rey drags her fingers along the ropes out of habit. The moons’ light filters through the foliage but her path is mostly cast in shadow. She stops in the middle of the bridge, between her treehouse and the one belonging to Cova Nell & Koo Millham. From here she can see the space below the treehouses and looks down to see a figure tending to a fire in the main circle of the camp. The form is tall and familiar, mostly obscured from this angle. Rey walks further along the bridge to shift her perspective and is drawn to the nearest set of spiral stairs. 

At the top of the landing she can see the individual in profile, illuminated in the campfire’s glow like a warm embrace in the darkness of the forest. He stands with a lopsided stack of books at his feet and wordlessly watches the blaze dance before him. It consumes the bindings & pages of several texts as they deform into bits of kindling. He glances up to where Rey stands but their eyes do not meet and she holds her breath as she recognizes his face. There’s something uncanny in his expression that makes Rey’s stomach drop.

General Ematt turns back to the fire. He bends down to pick up one of the books beside him and tosses it into the flames. 

— — —

Rey’s body had gone numb and the next morning she isn’t sure how she made it back to her bed and managed to fall back asleep. She debates telling Finn about what she saw last night. Rey isn’t quite sure if this rises to the level of being in trouble and yet there’s a pull of suggestion insisting it was no coincidence that she saw the General burning the books like the wookiee in her dream. She has difficulty settling the uneasiness in her chest when she remembers Ematt’s distant stony visage as he stared into the fire. She walks with Rose towards the mess hall for breakfast at first and breaks off to visit the sitting room with the lonely bookshelf. The room that held the remaining books.

Maybe _all_ of it was a dream. This is one way to tell.

She opens the door slowly and pauses to look out into the empty treehouse. The morning’s suns cast an airy brightness over the solitary bookshelf, the paled wooden floor, and the scattered handful of chairs. Rey remembers the stack of books that laid on the left wall. They are gone. There’s a heaviness in the sound of her footsteps as she crosses the threshold. Rey holds to an idle hope they were moved to the back of the room, comes to kneel in the spot where they once lay to survey the area from a lower view. They are definitely missing. Either all of them were borrowed or all of them were burned or there is something else —

She does not have time to process these considerations before hearing a knock on one of the walls. She glances up to see Poe at the entryway. “Madam Jedi.” He smiles with his greeting. “Thought I saw you duck in here.”

“Hi Poe.” She consciously turns up the corners of her lips in an effort to evade the uneasiness that lingers. Rey places her hands on her lap and makes sure to look at his face. “I was just leaving.”

He nods and comes in closer as she stands, running a hand through his hair. Rey notes the informal flair of his gait, the comfortable way he carries himself. “So are you coming with me off-world tomorrow?”

Rey glances to the window and back to Poe. “I… I didn’t realize you were serious.” She recalls the hardness of D’Acy’s words, the edge in her tone when she told Rey to be careful where she shows her face. “I’m not so sure I should go.”

“Well, I could use the company.” He places one hand in a pocket. “Come to the meeting circle five after dawn so we can head to Kachirho for the first shuttle.” There’s a pause as if he expects Rey to answer here, but she’s silent and he presses on. “You don’t have to say anything now if you’re not sure. I’ll wait for you ten minutes and then I’ll go. Have a seat open for you if you’d like it.”

Rey looks to the floor and back up to Poe. It’s the same thing he’s said to her the handful of times he’s approached her when she’s sat in the mess hall devouring her portion of lunchtime rations alone. She watches herself repeat the same basic motions again — One afternoon he passed a piece of fruit over to her plate as he said, “Beats being on a desert planet, right?” Another time he commented on her staff. Another time asked if she was able to sleep through the storm. Every time he pauses like he is waiting for Rey to answer and sometimes she does, but their short exchanges always end with the same offer before he leaves her be. _Have a seat open for you if you’d like it._ Rey never takes him up on it but she’s not sure why she has not. 

She considers Rose’s silent communications from the day prior and questions why Poe would seek her out, would risk further conflict with top brass for the opportunity to be alone with her. She files this query away for later review, thinks of it as one of the points on the mental maps she would chart of undisturbed sites on Jakku. Rey shakes her head as she responds.

“Not sure I’m an ideal companion for a business meeting.”

Poe chuckles with good humor rather than any offense at her initial rejection. “Sure you are,” but he doesn’t elaborate. “And we can take a break from staring at the same treehouses all day.”

Rey admits to herself it would be a welcome reprieve from all these things swirling within her, to experience a landscape aside from this one that has played backdrop to these intrusive memories. The bonfire, the books, the small gasps she made against Kylo’s chest in the darkness of her room, the hushed moans tumbling through her open window as she stifled her own, the tendriling sensation of bony fingers clasping her ankles to bury her beneath the ground. It was the same dragging down she felt before she walked out onto the bridge after she heard the whispering breeze entreating her to —

_Go see._

Yes, she could use a change of scenery right now. She nods softly. “I’ll think about it.” Rey shifts her weight on her feet and mulls aloud, “People will notice that I’m gone. What would I even say to Leia when we’re back?”

Poe shrugs. Just like the day before he appeals to his supposed authority and suggests, “You were following an order. Say I said you needed to come with me.” Rey tries not to change her expression and wonders if she did raise an eyebrow after all because Poe continues, “Everyone expects me to ignore High Command after all, right?”

She shakes her head and this time her smile is not forced. “Okay. Maybe see you at dawn.” She stands still as Poe leaves her in the sitting room and wonders what Uyter will be like.

— — —

Rey trains with Finn in the clearing later that afternoon, sparring with staffs and cycling through familiar forms. Both of them hold back a bit and they talk to one another between practiced rounds, neither feeling fully up for the focus and physical exertion that a concerted effort would require. Finn is frustrated that he’s roomed with Salaka Kuchimba, who is known for his propensity for sleepwalking from long before the Resistance arrived on Kashyyyk. Two nights in a row Finn woke up to his roommate pacing the treehouse and knocking on the walls. Apparently Minneau said that Kuchimba pissed all over his bunkmate one night on D’Qar thinking he had made it to the freshers and this knowledge makes Finn’s sleep stuttered & uncertain.

The living situation is further complicated by the fact that Kuchimba is one of the few people who can’t seem to trust him still, even after he put his life on the line on Crait. “Maybe he’d like me more if Rose let me crash.” Finn shakes his head and grinds the bottom of his staff in the dirt. Rey insists he’s being too cynical and to make sure Kuchimba visits the freshers before sleeping.

Again she asks herself whether she should tell Finn about what she saw the night before and second guesses the decision. She’s concerned he won’t dismiss the episode as a curious coincidence, that he will see meaning in the missing books too. There’s a part of her that doesn’t want her suspicions confirmed and another that’s worried Finn will react with a certain amount of apprehension, or feel dread in response to her ability to weave between dreams & subsequent realizations.

She remembers how some Resistance members were unable to meet her gaze when her bounty was announced, recalls how Kuchimba was one of those who looks at her coldly and never approaches. Rey wonders whether fear is a natural consequence of being close to the Force. Long before she was the last of their kind, those training to be Jedi were sent away from their homes in their youth. Even the fables of great masters had them at a distance from others, presumably for philosophical reasons but Rey wonders if it was for defensive purposes. To keep these beings stolen away lest they crack. The tales seemed so different before she felt the Force work within herself and these strange abilities made her feel like such an _other._

Rey knows that Finn would try his best to understand even though he never could. But she decides not to tell him anyway.

They take a break for some water and Finn’s sentence trails off as something catches his gaze over Rey’s shoulder. He pauses mid-stride in a stare and Rey looks behind her into the dusky border of the old-growth forest, hoping to catch whatever he saw wisping in the spaces between the worshyrs’ trunks. She sees nothing but trees and turns back to Finn.

“What is it?”

He shakes his head as if trying to dissuade himself of something; Rey can see it’s more for himself than for her. His eyes are slightly wide and he’s undeniably spooked. His grip shifts on the staff and there’s a stillness hanging between them before he responds.

“I thought I saw something. Don’t worry about it.”

“Finn.” As if he could possibly pretend he was unaffected by whatever it was he saw. And despite the things she’s kept hidden from her friend she entreats him to open up to her. “You can tell me.”

He bites his lip. “I thought I saw my mother.”

There’s a pause. Finn has never mentioned his family. She knew they were gone and didn’t even realize he remembered them at all. Neither one of them had reached that far into the past in their conversations quite yet. He continues. “Walking between the trees. Right there.” He looks to the ground. “I don’t know how but I knew it was her.”

Neither one of them state the obvious thing, that there’s no rational explanation for why Finn would see his dead mother wandering through the woods in Kashyyyk. Rey opens her mouth to speak but Finn says something first. “Wow I really need to get some sleep.”

“I think we both do.” Rey turns around to face the Black Forest with Finn and the pair stand to wait in the moment a bit longer, as if observing the site further will make her reappear.

Finn clears his throat and they both remember where they stand. “I can’t wait to get out of these kriffing woods.”

— — —

Rey looks forward to sleeping that night and to setting aside the day’s events. She lays in her bed to rest earlier than usual and feels the exhaustion creeping over her limbs. She decides that she does want to go off-world with Poe and likes the flickering bit of mischief it brings into the repetitive days on Kashyyyk. She thinks about Rose’s wink at her back in the communications tower, pieces together what she meant when she reexamines Poe’s attempts to befriend her. Rey hears two voices come through the open window as a pair of women cross the bridges to reach their own quarters, but she isn’t sure who they are without seeing their faces.

“...General Organa keeps saying ‘we’ll see soon’ and telling me to see D’Acy and D’Acy just says to ask Organa, wish someone could just give me a straight answer on when I can try send a message to my sister…”

The words drift off into more distant whispers and Rey is pleased to be alone in the treehouse, away from Rose’s idle curiosities that she voices aloud before sleep. Rose asks these questions as if she’s genuinely interested in what Rey has to offer in response, by virtue of circumstances sure but not by them alone. At least it doesn’t seem that way. Perhaps they’re attempts to open a line of more personal conversation, even to establish trust. Yet Rey can’t prevent her doubts from intruding, telling her that Finn, Rose, or Poe or anyone else would grow to fear her as she becomes more powerful with the Force.

Her awakening with the Force made the war itself seem smaller during these quiet moments to breathe before sleep. She’s confident she’s fighting for the correct side. She wouldn’t have turned down Kylo’s offer otherwise. She wants no part in a frantic drive to conquer, especially when it means accepting the annihilation of an entire planetary system. But the glory of getting to save the day at Crait was followed by this slow resettling on Kashyyyk. Their numbers are so insignificant when stacked against the First Order machine and she can’t imagine what High Command hopes to accomplish isolated in the forest especially when they keep their plans so close.

Rey remembers she has Skywalker’s broken lightsaber and the Jedi texts. She has the tools to decipher her own powers regardless of where she sleeps. She is no longer owned by another and the galaxy is a very large place. She ponders on how the days here roll on & over in this newly-forming routine. Another pair of words tumble through the open window and they are detached from footsteps or any other accompaniments suggesting they belong to a wandering Resistance member:

_Do you?_

She licks her lips as they slightly chap in the dry nighttime air and cannot suppress the most intrusive thought of all:

_Do you want to keep risking your life for these strangers —_

She dealt with the same inconsistency of portions payments whether her offerings were eventually sold to the New Republic or to the First Order. The war never mattered before. Sometimes she thinks back to Luke prodding her while they trained, insisting that it was all meaningless. She wishes she has more words to describe her feelings and cannot find them. She falls into her familiar pattern and holds to it like a mantra:

_You are no longer on Jakku._

She pushes it all away because she has to try and sleep. Rey remembers that she has to be up before dawn and considers what she knows of Poe Dameron. Finn had caught her up on his uprising against Holdo as cover for him & Rose on the _Supremacy_ and how Leia reportedly had to put Poe down with her weapon to bring him in line. He has a consistent passion and conviction that Rey finds intriguing. He’s always so certain when she is not. She feels like she can understand the logic behind his rebellion, can track that same survival mechanism locked within herself from being a scavenger for so long. He thought they were being marched towards certain death and had to act before he lost the opportunity. At least that’s what she saw in the versions of events as told to her, but it wasn’t a closely-held secret that others in the camp held Poe largely responsible for their diminished numbers.

It should be easy to keep her thoughts on Poe, who is certainly attractive in a more conventional way than Tanner or — than Tanner. Her gaze settles on Rose’s empty bed and the edge of the one of the moons rises just enough to shift the light in the darkened room. Rey doesn’t expect to feel the same absence in her bed as she did the night before, and tells herself it isn’t because she wants Kylo to appear there. She assumes the odds are slim he’ll show up like that again and she will not be pressed to have to explain herself any further than she did the day before. 

She avoided him admirably before and would do so again. They’ll just never discuss it. It doesn’t need to be addressed. A momentary lapse in judgment that will not be repeated. Rey thinks again about how Poe is a nice normal person to be attracted to and yet it isn’t his nice normal face she imagines over hers as she starts to drift into a dreamless sleep.

— — —

Rey awakens with a start and Kylo is there again.

She doesn’t have to glance to her right to know. She immediately looks to her left and sees Rose did return to the treehouse and lays asleep on her back, one hand on her stomach and the other above her head. Rey feels Kylo shift his weight beside her and inch closer as he comes to realize the bond has opened to place them together like this for a second time. Rey stares at the ceiling and absently feels him clutch his arm around her, but there’s a distance between them as he whispers towards her ear. “There she is.”

Again he subverts her expectations despite her coming with very few, for she herself does not know what to say. She feels a flutter unwind in her chest knowing that a small part of her did want this to happen, for him to appear in her bed. In order to chase the idle strain of curiosity that lingers, even if just to test the limits, physics, and strange sensations of the Force bond itself. But one time is simple to explain away as a regrettable moment of indecision, gives her an excuse to continue ignoring his appearances. More than once requires a better explanation.

And this time she is not alone.

She answers with the only thing she can think to say. “Hello.”

In these beats of time she anticipates him bringing her in tighter in his embrace or grinding against her or just saying something. None of this happens. It occurs to Rey that she’s the one who crossed a certain boundary the other night and she was the one to deny him the day before. She can tell he hesitates to bring her closer lest she tells him to stop, she realizes he’s waiting for her to present the suggestion rather than pressing her further. Despite once telling her he can take whatever he wants.

The one thing that lingers most is the feeling of her hand over him coming through as she rut up against _his_ hand, filtering through their connection as a backdrop to what she felt. Despite the numbness of the intrusive sensation itself, she had trouble not letting her mind wander to it at moments throughout the past day as she walked along the bridges and the staircases. She remembers his hand against her cheek and how she thought of him the night before as her fantasies kept wandering back to how it would feel if —

But she is not alone.

Rey wonders if he can sense the warmth that begins to unfold between her legs because he comes in to kiss her neck and she does not flinch. He brings a hand closer in to navigate below her shirt and up again to her breast. It feels strange how it seems to fit under his large palm so easily, she knows other women have more to grasp onto. The way the air stops in a room when the bond opens seems to heighten the brush of his skin against hers. That’s what she blames for the hushed tightness beneath his fingertips. She tells herself it’s not because she wants to test him further after she came much harder than she would have ever anticipated for someone using just his hands.

She credits this last bit to the Force and highly doubts it has much to do with Kylo Ren himself. But she’s not going to question this strange gift their bond has brought her. She isn’t sure she would have let things carry on as long as she did without it there in the first place. She places her hand over his to stop its movement when it gets to the top of her sleeping shorts. She knows she should say something. He does not know she shares a room. His hand remains still and Rey realizes he’s waiting for her to move.

She felt such a deep transgression when she imagined putting Rose in a compromising position that one time. And here she is the intermediary between compromising the two of them at once, making Kylo the unwitting exhibitionist and Rose the unwitting spectator. Rey admits she finds a kindling of curiosity in the power she holds over all those in her room. She is even a little excited — no, she’s not excited that seems too eager, she tells herself, _intrigued_ — by the whole idea of being not being caught by either party.

She sweeps in the thrill that this hidden knowledge brings. That they’re both key pieces in a game only she knows they’re playing. Rey pushes against Kylo’s hand to nudge it lower and he abides. She loses track of how many moments pass as their hands roam over each other’s bodies, she feels the shiver of her lips over her own skin when she kisses his neck. She tempts the idea of using her teeth for the sake of feeling its ricochet but consciously decides she does not want to mark him. She knows he must feel his own hands as he slips them below her clothes to grab her ass — the same way she feels her nails lightly graze his scalp as she runs her fingers through his hair. The warmth between her legs runs hotter, one part attraction and one part laboratory experiment. She wonders if he is as distracted by the expectation of _more_ as she is, as drawn to the temptation to feel out these mirrored sensations inside the other —

She notices the span of his hand over her form as he slides it down her skin, thinks to the way her breasts disappeared beneath them as he feels down her ribs, waist, and hips. His fingertips drag down beneath her shorts and outside her underwear, he rubs his thumb into the fabric but misses her clit. The bond between them pricks goosebumps on her forearms when he pulls the fabric to the side and slides a single finger inside as if to test her. He pushes in further once, twice more, before he withdraws. He brings his hand up and Rey feels the smudge of her slickness on her cheek. 

Rey turns on her side to face him and brings her lips towards his. His face brushes past hers and his voice inspires a heaviness below her navel when he exhales into her ear, “Are you always this wet and ready for me —“

It’s made as a statement rather than a question and Rey feels her cheeks flush. She’s surprised by what he says for a second time, not sure why didn’t expect him to be so forward. Unsure how to respond verbally, she decides not to at all. She curls up closer into him and pushes her mouth against his with a roughness tempered by her hesitance. She lifts to take a breath and nudges her teeth against his skin when she kisses him below his ear. His hands roam over the boundaries of her clothing, coming to her waist before moving to bring her shirt over her head.

Rey lets it happen and steals a glance to her left. Her arms are above her head and she wonders what it looks like to see her clothing cinch up and over on its own accord. Or what happens to her shirt when Kylo drops it into the space behind her, does it disappear after it leaves his grasp like his glove in the treehouse or does it lay crumpled on the floor? She had removed her breastband before laying down to sleep and without the shirt her nipples perk and pebble in the cool night air. The quiet stillness in the room magnifies the shuffling sound Rey makes in her bed as she removes her shorts, wiggling on her back.

He brings himself up to his knees and looks down upon her, taking the view in full before leaning forward to grab down her underwear. It stays by her knees and he pushes two fingers into her this time. He pumps them in and out twice before withdrawing, same as before, and he moves to bring her underwear down to her ankles. He seems so single-mindedly focused yet distracted by her naked body, as if unsure where to place his gaze.

It registers that he is still fully clothed and Rey’s eyes widen upon the realization that she’s totally exposed to Rose as well as Kylo. She looks to her left to see Rose has moved, but appears to sleep still. A scene of Rose’s eyes fluttering open plays through Rey’s head, seeing her alone with her knees apart and on her back shuddering as if she’s being touched. She can’t wake her up like this.

That’s when she sees Kylo looking in Rose’s direction too. He follows Rey’s line of sight. She lingered for too long, her face betraying just enough to pique his curiosity. She wants to bring her thighs closer together to not appear so obviously compromised, but makes no move to do so. He turns back to Rey, still looming above her while she lays beneath.

“Who’s there with you?”

His voice is flat, as if taking an inventory of figures to use in a larger calculation. She feels a glooming pit begin to open in her stomach. It’s the first question he’s asked about the details of her physical surroundings and she can’t inadvertently reveal anything about her location.

“She — She sleeps several feet away.” Rey hopes her whisper is audible. “Close quarters.”

“Hm.”

He looks down on her again and she’s even more self-conscious of her legs when he brings a hand up her thigh. She curses herself for opening them up so willingly when she’s now displayed before him. She knows she should have stopped this long ago. She could stop it right now too. But she doesn’t want to stop despite the complications it would raise in her life to cross this line with Kylo Ren.

She wants to find out how far she can press their bond to go, she wants to unearth these secrets about this dangerous treasure the Force has given her. She’s reminded of that glint she would sometimes spot in the burnt husk of a decaying frame that’s just been revealed by days’ worth of shifting desert winds. That anticipation right before making a discovery, claiming a prize, or burning her hand. She wants to keep pressing forward.

_Go see._

She hears a rustle of blankets to her left and looks over to see Rose shifting to lay on her stomach. Rey shuts her eyes and takes in a sharp breath when Kylo slips two fingers in her cunt again. She hears him exhale unnaturally when he presses his thumb against her clit and rubs it in an unclosed circle. 

“Kriff, are you always this tight?” He pushes his fingers in hard, as if seeking an answer to the question. She tenses up against him. The small slick sound that’s made when he slides his fingers out seems to echo in the treehouse and amplifies in Rey’s ears. The heat between her legs uncoils to a low throb in her thighs, her clit still slick and peeking out from beneath its hood. Even though he can’t be heard, he brings his voice low when he says, “Lucky that only one of us has to stay quiet.”

There’s something in how he says it that is both arousing and unnerving. Rey watches as he sits back to remove his shirt. She admires her handiwork in the scar that scales down his chest, she reaches out to graze her fingers along it as he shifts out of his trousers. She hears his knee sink into the mattress and she wonders if she’s supposed to feel bashful seeing him naked. She tries not to stare at his cock for too long but she’s certain he’s noticed her looking already.

Kylo puts his hands on her hips and signals her to shift. Rey moves to lay on her side with her cheek on a pillow, looking out at her room to see Rose has not stirred. Rey reaches for the blanket that’s ended up shoved and tangled beneath her knees and brings it up to cover her body from her roommate. She’d only awaken to Rey resting on her side, under a blanket that isn’t settling quite right.

She wonders if Kylo can see the blanket at all or if washes out in the scenery as the objects with him do for her. That pang of shame uncoils in her stomach again and she closes her eyes to shut out her surroundings. She feels him creep up behind her and all his skin touching hers at once curls within her and begets a sigh she’s quick to stifle. She drifts her top leg forward and he places his knee beneath it. Her pussy feels hot as she unfurls in front of him; the tip of his cock bobs against her folds as he tries to line up with her entrance from behind her. She stops mid-inhale when she realizes this traces her wetness over herself and she relishes in the stuttered breath he makes when he finally pushes into her.

He stops halfway, hesitates, and Rey feels his pause recoil between her thighs. Kylo brings an arm around her front and brings her back flush up to his chest. She tilts her pelvis up behind as he presses forward until she feels his hips up against her skin. She rocks lightly and clenches her walls to test the bond, and despite the muted plane of distance in the sensation she softly moans with the recognition of what it is — She feels herself tightening around him piggybacked to the shudder it draws out within her. And despite this being so wrong in so many ways, she cannot cease dwelling on the fact that she’s never felt anything like this before.

She has to remind herself not to be embarrassed by how slick she is, by how much he draws the dampness from within her as he juts in and slides out. She wonders if she’ll ever feel this far and this close ever again, knowing what it’s like to fill herself. Her cunt strains out around him and she’s pleasantly surprised by how sized he feels inside her. Neither one of of them is going to last very long like this.

He doesn’t have to keep his voice down and chooses not to. While no individual vocalization is particularly loud she hears each one of his ragged breaths at a higher decibel. They intersperse the lurid thwump of slapping skin and Rey’s feathered low swells of halted exhales. She snuffs one of her own particularly audible moans by trapping her mouth against the mattress. She loses her tether to the night air and catches some seconds of heady dizziness, like she lost her footing and balance for a brief moment.

She opens her eyes when Kylo pricks one of her nipples between his fingers. Rose is laid on her side, her face to the wall and her back facing Rey. Rey assumes she’s still asleep and feels a certain detachment in the realization that she won’t be able to see potentially open eyes. She won’t know if Rose wakes up.

A bead of sweat falls from Kylo and catches on her skin. Rey is drawn into the rhythm they’ve fallen into and lets the confluent sensations coil and build inside her. She slinks her hips back into his as he thrusts inside her, and feels some disconnect in that his hands are free to roam in this position and neither are attending to her clit. She feels his breath hot in her ear and in the bend of her neck, he still grasps her close to him and her frame feels tiny enveloped by him so completely like this. She brings her own hands down to her pussy, her fingertips graze over her clit briefly before she begins to attend more closely by flicking over it. She shudders back out of sync as she takes this next step to completion, and Rey isn’t sure she’ll be able to keep her voice down properly. Rose remains unmoving as Rey holds back a gasp.

Rey floats back to that fleeting dizziness from earlier and sees its dual use. She brings her hand up to Kylo’s and he lets her guide it up to settle on her neck. He pauses when she does, seated inside her and unmoving, second guessing what he thinks she intends. Rey applies pressure to his hand to lead his fingers to clasp her throat with a small nod and he assents. There’s a silent pressure that seems to lower the whole room as the Force curls around the sides of her airway and places her in a choke.

_That_ inspires him to push up inside her roughly and Rey wonders if he too can feel the haze overtaking her senses. She brings her hand back down below and silently sighs when she flicks her clit again. She knows he holds back in his grasp and every few moments there’s enough of a small release to pull her back from the verge of fainting. She loses any threads of earlier regrets and lets her pleasure settle within her, rushing through dizzy gasps that heighten the sensation of being so filled by him and feeling how she consumes  & clasps him within her. It drives her absolutely wild. She reminds herself not to rock against her mattress too hard.

It doesn’t take either of them long to build up and forward when they fuck like this and she hears him say her name as he creeps closer to his peak. “Ah, Rey — Rey, I can’t —“

But he can and he does and she wonders how he’s possibly taking her even harder, holding her back to stop his thrusts from pushing her forward while his hand stays curled just so to keep the pressure on her throat. She’s overwhelmed by him, lost in the power that he holds over her body. She steps back mentally to note that she’s allowing Kylo Ren to Force choke her in her own bed, fuck her in the middle of the Resistance’s camp, and it feels almost absurd to be so devoured by her enemy like this. Her nub feels swollen beneath her index finger as his cock presses up against her _there_ and she lets her countless reconsiderations melt away as she clenches hard around him before finding her release.

Rey wonders how loud she would let herself be in other circumstances. She stays admirably silent but is certain she sighs his real name before losing her footing. She curls her voice down into her chest and clenches her jaw as her body sighs around him and within his arms, her orgasm wrapping through her and making it sloppy between her legs as she struggles to find a breath inward. She’s aware of a throbbing and a heat riding inward and she rides the chain of the reverberation that shudders through when he unloads inside her. For a second it’s as if she’s going to come again before she loses it. She finds it odd not to feel the slick of semen pool within her and wonders where it went.

Neither of them move as they come down and he softens inside her. Rey feels his chest rise and fall with hers as she finds her breath, still holding her close to him. She’s not sure if she should speak and decides not to. They remain for a few moments before Kylo breaks the silence as he slides outside her.

“What — what was that.”

Her eyes flit to Rose’s back. The woman lays still. Rey assumes she’s asleep but she has no way to truly know. A gloom overtakes her stomach with the completion of this transgression, and this time not imagined. She violated a commonsense courtesy, intruded on Rose’s basic privacy and comfort, and yet beyond that gloom she’s strangely unfeeling. It’s not as if Rose is aware of it. She has not experienced the actual disturbance of these expectations, only privy to whatever vocalizations drifted into her dreams. Rey almost feels proud of herself, despite the needling feeling that she’s not supposed to be. She’s supposed to feel bad, but she doesn’t. She’s not sure what to make of it.

Rey shifts her weight to an elbow and whispers. “I don’t know.”

Kylo sits up to reach over Rey, bring his hand over to a flat surface just beyond the edge of her mattress. She realizes that his bed must be bigger than hers, and she turns on her back in time to see his face grimace when he touches something she cannot see. He brings his attention back to her and states, “So she’s still asleep.”

Rey nods softly and she swears she sees the corners of his lips twirl up just slightly. But it doesn’t register as a smile exactly, rather a sense of accomplishment. The moons hang low and full in the sky and create a strip of light that cuts across Rose’s bed.

That’s when he dips down and speaks directly in her ear. “Come to me, Rey.”

She doesn’t hesitate in her response. “No.”

He brushes his fingers over her neck again, applies a slight pressure like it’s an idle curiosity. Her denial hangs above them but he keeps his expression still. He takes his hand away.

“And why’s that?”

She can’t hold back a glare. It doesn’t need to be said. She doesn’t need this experience ruined by being pressed to remind him that he remains loyal to an empire built on homicidal conquest masquerading as a quest towards the greater good of centralized order. She sidesteps.

“You already know why.”

He shakes his head as if she got the answer wrong.

“Because you’re afraid if you come to me you won’t want to leave.”

She feels her heartbeat in her throat and she stays silent. She doesn’t want to admit that’s a part of it, not even to herself, and when she starts to say “no” for a second time she feels their connection start to dissipate. Kylo’s skin against hers fades into the darkness of the wooden walls behind him and Rey suddenly feels so empty that she groans in spite of herself. She dangles her arm to the floor to collect her clothing and detests that he managed to attain the last word in their interaction.

This time when Rose turns she ends up settled on her back. Rey hears her roommate exhale softly and that gloom does not leave as she slinks back into her sleepware. She feels sensitive & swollen with attained satisfaction between her legs, but her head starts to flit through all the potential consequences of this decision. It tangles into a regret that settles in her chest and doesn’t fully register until she feels that exhaustion in her bones again and begins to drift towards sleep. Right in the lapse of coherence between waking and dreaming, in those seconds prior to crossing over, the guilt rings in her ears like a bell in the room.

_What are you doing, Rey_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 4 will take a little longer to post with real life and all, 2-3 weeks?
> 
> Thank you for reading what's here so far and every view, kudos, and comment is sincerely appreciated. Follow me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics)


	4. Chapter 4

Rey manages to wake before dawn despite not sleeping through the night. She sits on the edge of her bed dressing quietly, feeling the stillness of the room in the glow right before the suns begin to rise. Rose faces the wall and Rey watches her back rise & fall as she breathes. She hoped Rose would awaken before her or with her, she was looking to gauge their morning routine for a hint of suspicion. It will have to wait until she returns to camp.

Rey pulls up the edges of her boots and wonders if she’s supposed to feel different in some way. But nothing has changed. She wakes in the same treehouse in the same compound on Kashyyyk surrounded by the same company who know nothing of her, much less of her interactions with Kylo Ren. She finds some amusement in that she’s asking herself the same question she did after leaving Aduro’s tent when she was fourteen. She’s even sorting similar contradictions, vacillating between satisfaction and regret. Back then she was content in having her curiosity fulfilled finally, yet had some understanding that she was entirely too young for such ventures even though they were the same age.

(It didn’t quite hit her fully until she told this story to Tanner three years later. It was only that once with Aduro but Tanner didn’t hide his bewilderment well. In hindsight the landscape with Tanner had never been marred by as many mines as this one she occupies currently, the circumstances were so much simpler — She stops before revisiting that cyclical nostalgia for a man long gone from this world. _You are no longer on Jakku._ )

She takes the rations pack and medikit she pilfered from storage the day prior. She places them in her satchel, pulls a cloak over her outfit and brings up the hood. The saber parts & Jedi texts rest below a floorboard beneath her bed that she has not sealed shut for ease of access. She kneels down to retrieve them and halts her hand mid-motion. Despite the items being left unguarded there’s something that compels her to stop, reminding her that it’s very unlikely she’ll have any use for a broken weapon or unintelligible books during this trip. She leaves them be and places the board back in position.

Rey stands, grabs her staff, and watches Rose for a moment longer. She says “I’m sorry” aloud before leaving even though she isn’t heard. It seems like something that needs to be said, even if only as a perfunctory duty. Even if she isn’t quite sure she’s actually sorry after having slept on the matter. She clears her throat for the excuse to have a few extra seconds to wait then steps out of the treehouse, following the rope bridges to the nearest staircase.

The bridges are deserted at this middling time before daybreak, though Rey can hear the rustling of early risers in some corners of the camp. When she goes this direction the border of the Black Forest is visible on the left with the camp’s circle to the right. The worshyrs appear drawn in closer to the bridges at this hour, a trick of the light that throws the ground beneath them in a deeper darkness than warranted at dawn. She sees a small figure dressed in white facing away to the forest on the last bridge before reaching the landing. The figure’s back is towards the camp and remains unmoving as Rey approaches, with no flinch of recognition or awareness of impending footsteps.

When Rey is right beside the figure she recognizes it as Cova Nell, wearing a long sleeping shirt that stops at her knees. She stands with her arms limp at her sides with a stillness so profound that Rey isn’t sure if she’s even breathing. Rey notes that Nell sleeps in one of the treehouses besides hers, briefly worried that perhaps she heard something if she was wandering the bridges at night — But she knows the strange gloom she feels spindling in her chest is not from these concerns, but rather the fact that Nell hasn’t acknowledged her yet despite Rey being right beside her. 

“Hi.”

The woman continues to stare into the old-growth forest, her dark hair billowing briefly in a passing breeze. Rey is uncertain whether to press the matter, clears her throat and figures she was not heard. She repeats a little louder, “Hi.”

Nell blinks and remains frozen at her watch. Her response is so quiet that Rey isn’t sure whether it’s directed towards her or to the woods themselves, but it’s in a voice that’s not entirely her own —

_“Go see.”_

Rey steps back, her heart pounding furiously as if shocked into awareness. She isn’t sure why she feels compelled to run and reminds herself to walk at a normal pace by counting each stair as she descends. The recurrence of those words is a fluke or even an illusion formed from her own misgivings, nothing more and nothing less. She dismisses the woman’s unawareness of her surroundings as a lack of consciousness, perhaps she sleepwalks too. Or was just being rude.

Rey can see a figure at the meeting circle and brings her hood up as she crosses the clearing. She glances back to see Nell lingering at her vigil, planted at the same spot on the bridge with her back to the camp. Rey closes her eyes a moment and shakes her head. There’s no reason to be so unsettled by such an insignificant interaction and she files it away for later review.

She returns her attention to the mission at hand, reminds herself to put on a good show for the day ahead and to relish in the opportunity to visit another planet she has never seen. Poe sits on one of the logs, watching Rey as she approaches. He stands to greet her with a smile when she comes in closer. “The Madam Jedi arrives.”

She still doesn’t understand why he calls her that. She hardly feels like a Jedi with her lack of training, lightsaber, or even cursory understanding. But the nickname works she supposes. She likes hearing him say it.

“Hello.” Rey is unsure what to do with her hands and places them behind her back.

“Glad you decided to come.” Poe reaches into his pocket to check for something, perhaps the credits needed. She sees him look back at the treehouses before returning his attention to her. “We have a flight to catch.”

She lets out a small yawn. “Do you think they’ll have caf there?”

“Probably. Have you been to a shuttle station before? They’re all pretty much the same no matter where you go.”

Rey stops herself from biting her lip. “No, I haven’t.”

But he does not make any remark about her lack of sophistication. “Not missing much. If it was up to me we’d fly there ourselves.”

He nods to the pathway towards Kachirho. The artificial opening of the tree at the head of the meeting circle seems unusually dark with Poe framed within it. She notes that the space inside is large enough even for Chewie to stand in and brushes past her companion to peek her head inside.

“Forget something?” Poe asks her back.

“No.”

“Find anything interesting?”

She isn’t sure there’s another way to describe it aside from what it appears to be. “Just a small pile of rocks.”

— — —

Kachirho is not as fantastic as the mental image Rey crafted from everyone’s desire to escape to the place. She envisioned something closer to the skyscraper holovids of Coruscant, but the repurposed worshyrs here create a special majesty of their own. She keeps her hands up to stop her hood from falling as she cranes her neck up to examine them, trying to puzzle out the engineering required to make these spaces _in_ the trees themselves. They are connected by reinforced rope bridges that appear far more tightly-wound than the ones at the compound, even from so far below. They remind her of webs from this angle, some slightly sag  & sway from the weight of footsteps upon them.

Chewie explained on one of their hikes that this place was rebuilt after the inhabitants were freed from The Empire’s shackles, refinished to resemble something closer to the planet’s centuries of lore and culture. Renovating Kashyyyk’s architecture had been one small way to help raze away the reminders of the wookiees’ enslavement, though Rey suspects all signs will never leave fully. Even here she finds herself glancing to her feet as she follows Poe past the docks to the shuttle station, looking down for hints of treasure beneath the dirt. A part of her wonders whether if the individuals here find themselves going through the same motions of servitude, much like she finds herself doing right now. Rey does not respond to a female wookiee who appeals to her to look at her wares, which amount to swatches of fabric spilling from boxes into the cart. Rey flinches when the woman reaches out as if to stroke the cloth of her hood.

Rey was unaware of the tightness in her chest until she enters the shuttle station behind Poe, relieved to be separated from those beginning to spill into the city for the day’s start. The station itself seems dimly lit despite the abundance of recessed lights in the dark wooden walls. Two attendants man the elevated ticket counter. Rey idly asks herself why they sit behind barred windows as she observes the shuttle schedule flit over the screens beside them. The station is fairly empty at this hour and she watches the handful of individuals pace between the benches as Poe goes to purchase the tickets. There are four looming tunnels behind the ticket counters with a small concessions stand in between. She cannot see where the tunnels end and isn’t sure why it reminds her of the opening in the tree at the head of the meeting circle.

“Think they have caf?” Poe asks as he hands Rey her ticket, nodding to the concessions stand. Rey shrugs and he goes to check with the unspoken understanding that she should not be the one to approach any counters with the bounty out for her head. She notes there’s only one other humanoid in the station besides the two of them, questions whether it was wise for her to take Poe’s offer when they don’t blend in quite so easily. Poe does not tarry and returns momentarily to hand Rey her cup of caf, sipping on his as he starts to walk to the nearest tunnel. She catches the humanoid staring at her, glancing up & down in a manner she finds somewhat unnerving. It’s unclear whether he recognizes her or merely is ogling over the existence of a breathing female. She adjusts the hood again, uncertain if he can see her face and hurries to follow Poe.

The tunnel terminates at a docking station. A weathered shuttle sits with its front loading hatch open and Rey recognizes it as a Vader-era Star Commuter 2000 from seeing a handful flying over Jakku (albeit most arrivals there were somewhat more modern). Poe taps her shoulder and points to some faded graffiti on its side that reads “Fuck The Empire.” She’s surprised it’s never been cleaned and Poe comments, “Wookiees don’t forget.”

They duck down to go through the open hatch and an RX-series pilot droid chirps a greeting as they enter. There are six rows to choose from with double seats on each side to hold 24 passengers total. They move to sit next to one another in the very last row and wait silently to depart. No additional passengers board in the five minutes before the hatch closes and Rey moves to occupy the set of double seats across the aisle from Poe upon realizing they’re alone.

The departure announcement comes over the speakers and Poe inches in to take his aisle seat. He leans back the chair to put his feet up on the headrest in front of him. “Looks like Uyter isn’t a popular destination.”

“At least not at this hour.” Rey sits with her back on the window and her legs resting over both seats. Her legs are crossed at the ankles, feet drooped over the aisle. She feels the vibrations of the ship as the engines start up and yearns to be at the controls, knows this is something she and Poe have in common. Perhaps they have more in common too. _A nice normal person to be attracted to,_ she reminds herself, in spite of not feeling it as anything more than a clinical observation. She glances to the rear of the ship and back to the autonomous pilot and isn’t quite sure whether they can speak freely. “Do you think anyone’s noticed I’ve gone yet?”

Poe reaches into a cargo pocket on the leg of his pants to pull out his comlink. He examines it briefly before holding it out to Rey. “Wouldn’t know. Comlinks haven’t been working anyway.” He shakes the device as if that might fix it. “Signal is down here too.”

“Might be Kashyyyk’s satellite,” Rey suggests, even though she knows it cannot be that as Connix has been able to get some of the detection systems working beyond local networks. “Maybe try pinging Snap & Jess from Uyter.”

She watches the stars streak in the window behind Poe and something occurs to her, something that surprises her in that she never thought of it before now. Rey shifts to take her seat sideways, feet planted in the aisle so Poe can hear her lowered voice. “What is Leia using to speak with her contacts in Mytaranor? Maybe ask her to ping Snap & Jess for you.”

Poe furrows his brows as if weighing out how to respond. It strikes her as unusual for someone so heavily associated with rashness around camp post-Crait and Rey feels compelled to fill the silent air with additional commentary.

“Didn’t D’Acy say they’ve received a few late responses to the distress signal? Maybe she can send it or…” Rey stops when she notices that Poe is fiddling with a ring on his necklace, something she has never seen him do before.

Poe places it back under his shirt and turns his attention back to Rey. “Not sure. No one has told me how. And I’ve asked.” He pauses. “My theory is Ematt’s handling the messages when he goes into Kachirho but that wouldn’t be secure —“

Rey can’t help herself from interrupting. “How do you not know? Aren’t you in High Command?”

“Not in spirit. Barely tell me anything.” He ekes out a lopsided smile. “That does not leave this ship, Madam.”

“Of course.” Rey looks to her feet, embarrassed that she’s likely misstepped again in a social interaction. She shouldn’t have asked. She clears her throat and changes the subject. Sort of. “Rose has talked about wanting to leaving, others too. Think it’ll be soon?”

Poe sits upright and mirrors Rey’s posture, sitting sideways in his seat with his feet in the aisle. He leans forward to speak with his hands on his legs when the pilot droid chirps over the speakers — “Please leave the aisles unobstructed at all times. Thank you.”

Rey moves to sit in her window seat and Poe crosses the aisle to sit beside her. He brings his voice down to nearly a whisper despite the closer proximity. “This also does not leave this ship. But I doubt it. Don’t think it’ll be soon.” His exhale sounds exasperated as he runs his hand through his hair. “Other day D’Acy was asking about the ‘short list of locations.’ She hasn’t even seen it and Leia just… She just ignored it and Ematt was saying that we can make it work, going off about ‘natural splendor.’” Poe does not hide the mocking in his tone when he quotes the man. “And Leia was _agreeing_ with him. Between you and me I’m not convinced the short list exists.”

Rey raises her eyebrows, unsure what to do with this information quite yet as it contradicts what was presented to the Resistance at the most recent general assembly. She expects some level of obfuscation from High Command — clarified by the fact that nearly everyone at camp seems to think she killed Snoke despite Leia knowing otherwise. But a blatant deception to her own soldiers just seems _inconsistent_ with the woman’s character, at least based on what Rey knows of her thus far. All Rey can think to say is “Wouldn’t it be better for morale for us to leave though?”

“Exactly what I said. Morale.” Poe chuckles but there’s no mirth in the sound. “Think it nearly killed D’Acy to agree with me too.” He reclines his chair and Rey follows suit. This time he looks Rey in the eye and she’s caught off guard by his somber tone. “There’s something up with Leia. This — She hasn’t been….” He struggles to find his phrasing. “She hasn’t been herself since we landed here.”

Rey consciously works to keep her expression neutral. “What do you mean?”

“Aside from not prioritizing getting us to a place where we can actually park any ships we pick up?” Poe leans out to the aisle to look at the pilot droid’s back as if to confirm they’re still alone. He turns back to Rey. “Sometimes we have to call her three, four times before she answers. Or she loses what she’s saying while she’s saying it. I’ve known Leia a long time, something isn’t right. I think some others have noticed too and haven’t said anything.” He pauses again. “It’s like she’s not really all there.” He looks out to the window across the aisle and stops.

Rey stares at the headrest in front of her, unsure how to interpret the numbness that Poe’s words elicit in her limbs. There’s a rootlessness that comes over her, a recognition that she’s cast her lot with these near-strangers who may not have a leader at the controls. Her confidence in Leia’s capability to give orders had never been challenged until this moment and Rey finds herself cataloguing their interactions on Kashyyyk, trying to seek out this thread of instability that Poe sees. She isn’t sure why he chooses to share this with her, as opposed to What’s-His-Face, Connix, Finn, or any number of others. Perhaps he can sense that she’ll never tell another. Or maybe he has told the others already.

She considers sharing what she saw Ematt doing that night in camp. She remembers the way the orange glow of the fire flickered over his face and keeps circling back to the words “natural splendor” as if they were what drew him to the flames. She questions whether her dream and its subsequent & shifted reality signalled a change in his mindset and thinks back to that last general assembly again. Ematt didn’t mention anything about leaving per se besides the need for more ships before they could. And Poe didn’t say anything about D’Acy. She’s overthinking it. There’s no legitimate reason to think that High Command is truly unstable. At moments like this when she weighs all possibilities on their scales it can be difficult to tell if her feelings are her own inner monologue or being suggested by the Force.

She recalls Finn’s story of how Leia made it back to the _Raddus_. “How long was Leia in the vacuum of space?”

Poe brings a hand to his face as he mulls it over. “Time it took to run up to the bridge. It’s amazing she survived at all.”

“Not breathing for that long. Could have brain damage.”

“Yeah. Maybe.” When Rey sees Poe raise his eyebrows she immediately realizes she could have misstepped, maybe he thinks she’s questioning Leia’s physical capacity to lead. “I’ve thought that too. D’Acy said I’m reading too much into it. We would have noticed earlier, right?” When he looks Rey straight in the eye she wonders if he’s looking for reassurance that this is the case. He can’t hide that he’s worried about Leia. He asks his next question in a more serious tone that lowers his voice. “You know about The Force. I’ve been meaning to ask you, wanted to before anyone else.”

Rey adjusts position slightly, unprepared for the conversation to take this turn. “I only know a little bit.”

“Good enough for me. Look, Leia took me aside the other day and said she thinks Kylo Ren is nearby. Has been to the camp. Not quite in those words but same thing. We saw her use The Force to get back to the ship and he uses The Force, do you think it could be related? I don’t know if it’s that or — or if it’s related to the rest of it. Whether to take it seriously.”

Rey hopes her cheeks have not flushed and tries to sweep aside the heavy feeling that makes it feel as if she’s sinking into her chair. Leia knows something, but for how long? Rey reminds herself not to look out her window, not to break eye contact with Poe lest he overanalyze her physical response. At first she opens her mouth to ask when this conversation took place but stops before she does. It doesn’t matter when it happened, if it was before or after Rey felt Leia try to glance into her thoughts at assembly. Rey sees some irony in that she’s relieved Poe doesn’t know whether to accept Leia’s intuition at face-value and feels some misgivings for the perverse consolation it gives her. Nearly every day at Kashyyyk is a swirl of contradictions, and this is no different.

By the same token Rey finds it curious Leia turned to Poe to reveal this potential danger, if it was framed as a danger instead of something more sentimental. She asks herself why Leia would go to Poe when she’s aware that Rey communicated with Kylo through The Force at Ahch-To (at least her watered down version of it) — She thinks back to how Leia did not share her opinion on whether Kylo was beyond saving himself, her expression mostly unchanged when Rey told her he declined the offer to come home. She wonders if Poe knows that Kylo is Leia’s son; she assumes he does but cannot tell by the way he asks. Maybe he thinks she’s the one who does not know.

She tamps down a consideration that comes to her without prompting — whether she should tell Kylo his mother may not be well, unsure that he is owed this knowledge at all in the first place. She files this away for later review.

She pushes the conversation forward to set all these things aside, plays it off as she needed time to formulate a response to Poe’s query. “It could be related to The Force. There’s a way to communicate through it, to sense if another is nearby.” She isn’t sure if what she says is totally correct.

“Okay but then you would sense him too and you haven’t, right?”

Rey doesn’t know how to answer. She doesn’t know whether all Force users can sense one another or if it’s only some and not others. She doesn’t know whether what she & Kylo share is something rare or has been a common occurrence historically. She doesn’t know if Leia sensed Kylo due to familial relation or a more advanced knowledge of The Force in general. Luke did not tell her any of these things and the Jedi texts lay uninterpreted beneath the floorboard. But she does know not to correct Poe’s assumption.

“I haven’t felt him, no.”

She feels warm as her thoughts wander back to last night — the way Kylo clutched her so closely, the way she held back her voice to not disturb Rose, the way the room fell when he choked her. She isn’t sure why she led his hand up to do that. Or why thinking about it doesn’t feel as wrong as it probably should, even as she misleads Poe who has been kind to her.

“Ah.” Poe seems disappointed. “I was hoping you wouldn’t say that.”

Rey shrugs and watches the lights streak past her window.

— — —

The station at Uyter’s capital is pretty much the same as Kachirho’s, just as Poe said back at camp. This one is more brightly lit with six tunnels instead of four, but contains the same basic layout with the barred ticket station and concessions stand bisecting the entrances to the shuttles. The waiting area here is a little more crowded, but not by much.

They do not tarry and exit the station. Rey brings her hands up to her hood to move it further forward over her face, which helps to shield her eyes when adjusting to the brightness of the planet’s two suns hanging high in the sky. Central City is somewhat more urbanized in the conventional sense with two- to four-story buildings built from clay bricks that range in shades of gray, brown, and orange. The roofs are mostly thatched or cobbled together with shingles of mismatching materials that create an aesthetically pleasing pattern despite the apparent disorganization. The city’s roads are narrower than Kachirho’s and its occupants appear to be mostly humanoid. Many wear long tan robes over their clothing, which comforts Rey in that her dark brown cloak doesn’t stand out too much from the general crowd. There are several bright spots of flashier colors, mostly from the shop fronts and civic offices lining the streets. Rey prefers the way Kachirho is built in and with the natural landscape and sees no trees lining the streets here. 

Rey backs up as a speeder departs from the taxi stand in front of the station. A squat individual with gills on his neck is next in the line and gestures to her & Poe to indicate that he’s available to transport them. Poe turns to Rey and asks, “Ever seen an Imperial Academy?”

Her gaze follows the steps of the various folks milling about and she wonders if any of the idle glances towards her will stir some sort of recognition. “Can’t say I have.”

“There was one here for years, officer training and such. Abandoned decades ago, think at some point after the Battle of Endor.” He takes a hand from his pocket and signals the driver. “Want to see?”

Rey already flouted authority by going with Poe and they are here to meet his contact, the one that needs raw materials to provide four ships. A part of her doesn’t understand why they’ve come in the first place, she has trouble imagining the Resistance wandering the mines of some far-flung asteroid. A flutter in her chest insists that she not push things further than she already has and says as much.

“Are you sure we should be going off-course?”

“Both are in the same town, little bit outside Central City. Won’t take long, we can go on the way to our destination.” Poe smiles and starts walking towards the speeder. It’s roofless & gray, shaped like a square with rounded corners, two seats in the front & two in the back. “Come on, let’s do some sightseeing.”

Yet in spite of her hesitation, she yearns to take hold of this chance to explore something new. She’s never been to Uyter. She’s never seen an abandoned Imperial Academy (or an academy at all for that matter) and wonders if the worn building will remind her of the rusty expanses of sand-sunken ships scattered over Jakku.

_Go see._

“Alright.”

The pair take the double seat behind the driver and Rey watches the landscape change as they ride out to their destination. The buildings become more spread out as they move forward like an unraveling and fraying string until their cab is speeding over a straight dirt road that cuts through farming fields that continue out to the horizon. The lull lasts only for a moment until they come up to four pillars cutting the sky in a clearing. The speeder slows down to a stop and Rey opens her door to go closer while Poe pays the driver.

The abandoned academy building rests on an small artificial hill to the right of the open field with the pillars, four stories tall and made of carved stones. The crest of the Empire nestles in the roof’s gable that faces the road, coarse and weathered from years of inattention. The whole structure is textured by rains and mossy patches; green leaves grow up and over the entire left side, taking root over the stubbled rock and continuing down over the grass. A stairway leads up to the yawning entrance, a pointed arch that’s both looming and inviting like a held breath before telling a secret. There’s a town a short journey away in the distance, comprised of squat buildings and a communications tower. A pedestrian walkway meanders from the left side of the building to the town and Rey sees a handful of individuals strolling on the path. The place appears to be an object of local curiosity of sorts, a historical site left to waste away and be consumed by the planet’s surface.

Poe comes up beside her and they climb the steps, shifting to one side to go single file as a couple coming down the staircase passes by them. Rey looks up to examine the designs carved beneath the tip of the pointed arch. She feels her hood fall and shuffles to put it back on as they go inside. Her footsteps echo in the entrance hall, which leads to a smaller hallway flanked by more pillars. Deteriorated tapestries hang high on the walls, their colors limp and muted. There’s a fireplace taller than a wookiee on one side, the floor around it stained by ashes.

“Ever seen an Imperial Academy?” Rey asks.

“Can’t say I have,” he answers with a chuckle, reusing her response from earlier.

“The Empire used this location for officer training?”

Poe paces the length of the entrance hall, looks up to the high ceilings that are spotted with holes where lighting fixtures used to be. “Some stormtrooper training too. Real tough to get in apparently. Town built up around it for the staff and students.”

Rey is distantly aware of footsteps in the hallway, walking to the middle of the room to look down at the symbol branded on the floor. It’s an ornately decorated Empire crest, still dark and legible after so many years of being walked upon. There’s no graffiti here like the shuttles on Kashyyyk, the place has been left alone as a reminder but one treated with a certain amount of reverence. She doesn’t make much of the footsteps growing louder until they cease.

“Is that Poe kriffing Dameron?”

Rey’s blood runs cold and she turns to see two individuals stopped by the fireplace with Poe. One is a humanoid male a little taller than Poe, with short-cropped blonde hair in straight trousers and a long leather jacket that stops halfway down his thighs. He stands with a brown-scaled reptilian and Rey cannot tell where his black opaque & pupil-less eyes settle in the room. He’s taller than her but shorter than his companion, with ridges running down along his head and a two-nostriled nose on the front of his face. Rey has not encountered too many saurins over her lifetime, she can recall a small contingent of five merchants that regularly came through the Outpost for a couple years when she was young but no one else. She makes a point not to stare at either one of them too long lest her face be seen.

The blonde one reaches out a hand and Poe shakes it, stepping in closer to give the man a pat on the back. “Errol, it’s been awhile. How the hell are you?”

The saurin stands at a distance from them, arms crossed as he appears to watch the men greet one another. Rey returns her attention to the crest on the floor, certain that her face is covered at this angle. She’s just far enough away from Poe to pretend she’s a separate party who need not be roped into this brief reunion.

“Doing well, out here for a new contract. Still out there fighting for good of the galaxy?”

Poe laughs. “Of course, you know it.”

She thinks she hears someone clicks his tongue. “This is my business partner, Jord.” There’s a pause in the conversation and Rey imagines him gesturing to the saurin. She hears movement and another pat on the back, Jord murmuring a “hi” of his own.

“And your fairer companion?” Errol asks.

She remains silent, waiting for Poe to seize the chance to correct Errol’s mistake and say she’s someone unrelated. Instead he says “Ah, this is one of my teammates —“

Kriff. Rey cuts him off before her name slips out. “Liza. Nice to meet you.” Poe may be at ease but her instincts insist she not take any more chances this trip, especially when she’s been placed in a situation where it’s rude not to show her face. She joins them by the fireplace, bringing her hood back slightly so that her features are dimly revealed under shadow.

She can see Poe is caught off-guard briefly but he recovers without missing a beat. He looks to Rey when he says, “Liza, Errol was one of my first Red Squadron recruits. Great pilot. Haven’t seen him since he left to go be the richest man in the galaxy.”

Errol smiles. “Got a long way to go.”

Rey keeps mostly still, her arms hanging at her sides beneath the cloak as she glances to the dusty floor. Both she and Jord stay silent as the two men catch up and she thinks their gazes meet at points but is not sure.

“What sort of business you into?”

“Running the mining permits on three asteroids, right off the hyperspace channel that cuts east-west outside Concordia. We do some of the shipping too, opening a second hub on Durkteel.”

This seems too close to be a coincidence and Rey makes the connection just before Poe says it aloud. “You don’t happen to know a Kaydel Ko Connix do you?”

“Kaydel? Yeah, from long before either one of us joined up with you fuckers.” Errol laughs despite his crude choice of words and it doesn’t come off as insulting. “Told her she’s wasting her time but she’s a woman on a mission and she’ll play until she wins.”

It occurs to Rey that it’s strange Connix would say her friend may not be sympathetic to the Resistance when he used to be a part of it. It’s equally curious that Errol left in the first place, long before their numbers were reduced so substantially. She considers finding a point in the conversation to bring it up but doesn’t want to participate any more than is strictly necessary.

Errol continues, “She make it out?” He does not need to refer to the evacuation of D’Qar or the escape from Crait explicitly to clarify what he means.

“Yes.” Poe’s posture becomes more casual and Rey is surprised to see him be so open with this man. Though she supposes he should be receiving Connix’s message any day now, once they figure out how to send it.

Errol nods. “Good. Deserves to go out in a blaze of glory, not shot down like some animal in a salt field.”

Rey raises her eyebrow at this but Poe is unaffected. “You know anyone with ships in the region, light craft?”

Jord crosses his arms as he shifts his weight on his feet. He moves to speak but remains silent, adjusting the way his satchel rests across his shoulder. Errol considers the question for a moment. “I might. I’ll think about it. Guy I’m meeting here is looking for a bulk contract to manufacture some, I can introduce you.”

It occurs to Rey that this may be the individual Poe was planning to meet with already, which would fully close the circle if that were the case. It would cut the Resistance out of playing the middleman if both their contacts connect up directly, potentially undermining Poe’s entire plan to get the ships for far fewer credits than pre-builts. She wonders if Poe is considering this possibility too, albeit she does not know how many manufacturers are based in this area.

“Thanks,” Poe replies with a nod. “Touring the sites?”

“You can say that.” It’s the first time Jord speaks. “Wasting time.”

Errol corrects him with a hint of mischief running over his expression. “ _Killing_ time you mean. Meeting isn’t for a while longer.” He cracks his knuckles absentmindedly and the noise crunches uncomfortably in Rey’s ears. “Impressive what they’ll have to work with here.”

“Who?” Poe asks.

“First Order. The academies?” Errol waits expectantly for Poe to understand and looks to Rey who doesn’t know what he means either. “I assumed you would have heard already of all people, First Order announced they’re reopening the Imperial Academies. Officer training and all the way down.”

“Really.” Poe’s reaction is said almost like an afterthought, there’s something in the tone that sounds like the breath was taken from his lungs. “Even here? Uyter was represented in the Senate, have they declared for the First Order?”

“Not that I know of. Senator got fried, don’t know anything about the guy replacing her.” Errol nods and gestures to one particularly chewed-looking tapestry above the fireplace. “Going to take a long time to bring this place back up to shape. Wouldn’t be surprised if their new Supreme Leader is full of shit. Loses interest —“

“Titus saw the mayor giving a tour to some planner the other day,” Jord offers. Rey does not know who this is but both Poe and Errol turn their full attention to him as he says it. “Nice clothes, holopad, spectacles, followed by a protocol droid, you know the type.” His eyes narrow slightly, as if entreating Errol to consider his next words carefully. “The locals will be pleased. More contacts for our Durkteel project too.”

“But this is not good news for our friend Poe Dameron.” Errol heartily pats Poe’s back and walks to the middle of the crest on the floor, sweeps a hand over it as he speaks. “The potential economic stimulus will be too much for some of those headless New Republic holdouts to ignore.”

Rey notices Poe furrow his brow as he reaches for his necklace briefly, about to start that fidget again but he places it back in before he does. “We’ll see,” he says with a grin. “The Resistance has plenty of fight left and the Republic knows we’re at the ready —“

“You really think that?” Errol’s question is pointed by an air of disbelief. “The New Republic got _decapitated_ in the Hosian system and you were a bunch of radicals to them before that even.” He shakes his head. “I don’t expect you to tell me how many of you are left but I doubt the New Republic or whatever is left of it is going to place bets on a couple hundred terrorists on some rock in the Unknown Regions when they can just try to come to some sort of understanding without anyone else getting killed.”

Rey swallows hard. She dismisses his insults but her stomach dropped with the words “couple hundred” — he imagines their situation so pathetically with their numbers significantly _multiplied_ inadvertently. She hasn’t assessed their status from an outsider’s perspective in quite this manner. It’s jarring to hear so little hope. There’s something disquieting in what he says that seeps in as a physical response, coming to creep beneath the skin of her arms. Rey sees Jord start to pace the room, glancing up to the ceiling as he does. This would be that point in the conversation to ask Errol why he left, the one she was looking for earlier, but it feels wiser to let him keep talking on his own.

And he does. “It was a bad bet years ago and an even worse one now. Send the old bitch Organa my regards, hope she’s changed her slogans at least.” The way he speaks about Leia makes it obvious why Connix did not mention her contact’s prior role in their ranks. Errol exhales. “Look, you’re a good man Dameron, always been good to me. Promise me you’ll take care of Kaydel and I’ll get you your ships. I’ll give you my link.”

Jord stops beside Errol on the crest and elbows him as he removes a flask from his satchel. “Let’s drink on it,” the saurin suggests despite a lack of any outward enthusiasm.

“Great idea.” Errol takes the flask from his companion and holds it out to Poe. “Why don’t you do the honors?”

Poe doesn’t reach out for it initially, slowly walking over to the crest and nodding to Rey to follow. “What are we celebrating?”

“Cooperation,” Errol says, raising the flask in the air as a toast. “New friends and old. To Dameron and Liza and to the whole kriffing Resistance, long may it reign.” He does not take the first sip and hands it to Poe.

“Sounds good to me.” Poe takes the flask and raises it as well. “To the Resistance.” The swig he takes is a couple seconds longer than is customary. He clears his throat twice as he holds the drink out to Rey.

She does not want to drink nor does she want to be impolite and the latter outweighs the former. The concern feels strange given that the one just called Leia a bitch in front of her, but he did agree to help arrange for ships. And that’s a win for them. “To the Resistance,” she says before taking a sip. The taste is uneven & numbs her tongue, the liquid burning her throat. She coughs as she holds the flask out to Errol.

That’s when Poe coughs too and Rey looks up to see Jord placing a hand on Errol’s arm to stop his movement before he takes a swig. A haze draws over the entrance hall, the dark gray stones becoming static behind fading clouds. She coughs again from the taste, to dislodge that weight in her chest, and at first she’s surprised — she’s had strong drinks before but this is entirely too fast and even then this is entirely too strange —

The detached dizziness she feels is not the same as when she asked Kylo to draw the air from the room. She sees Poe stagger to maintain his balance in her periphery. The tapestries begin to swirl together as she feels her feet become uneven. When she looks up the spaces in the ceiling expand into a growing blackness.

She hears the thud of Poe falling to the stone floor beside her.

— — —

Rey does not know how much time has passed, her vision is still black and she feels the kiss of fabric against her face. A cloth sack on her head. She lays on her stomach on a cold floor, aware that both her hands and feet are bound. More of her senses come to full awareness as she adjusts to her current position without being able to see her surroundings — the stale scent of recycled air, the small hum of vibrations coming up her spine, the beeps of a navigation systems message —

She’s on a ship.

She wriggles her wrists to test the binds, certain she can find a way to slip out. The ropes dig into her skin when she does and the ties at her ankles do not have any give either. But it is not insurmountable. She halts her efforts when she hears a familiar voice, one she was introduced to very recently, that seems to come from the front of the ship. She does not want them to realize she’s awake.

“... I sympathize with your nostalgia, Errol, but _Liza_ can fetch us more than what we need to complete construction and then some. Can’t believe you didn’t recognize her, when she was with that chump Dameron especially — don’t look at me like that, you know it’s true — He’ll find his way back home from the Academy fine and we’ll fetch ourselves a nice prize for the Jedi. There are _three_ request codes on this listing, they’re not messing around. Key in the first one and see what they say …”

She lays still to consider her options when she realizes she’s come to Kylo after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big shoutout to my beta [@elemie89](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elemie89). 
> 
> Thank you again for every view, kudos, and comment. Your support and feedback is greatly appreciated. Been having a lot of fun writing this and anticipate the next chapter being posted week after next (will go up earlier if finished before then). Do not fear, Kylo will return then :)
> 
> Follow me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics)


	5. Chapter 5

Rey assumes the vibrations of the ship lulled her back into a brief sleep because the next thing she hears is Errol reading off the digits for what he says is the second request code. The sounds in the ship are heightened with her vision obscured by the cloth sack — the comms system chirps as each number is punched in and there’s a short hum of static before an automated voice reads off a set of coordinates. Rey repeats them to herself in an attempt to commit them to memory but loses track too quickly to do so. The craft resumes its movement, presumably to the indicated location.

The captors are silent and Rey sorts through her available options. ... She can continue squirming against the ropes around her wrists & ankles and try to focus her energy on loosening them, unsure if that’s something she can actually do with the Force. … She can raise her voice to take command of the ship like she did with the stormtrooper, have one of them untie her binds and let her take them somewhere else. Can she even hold their minds long enough to have them surrender their blasters? It’s not as if she’s had the opportunity to practice this facet of her abilities, being surrounded by people whose agency she does not want to violate. … She’s glad she left the saber parts & Jedi texts beneath the floorboard, unable to bear even the hypothetical thought of losing her one connection to unlocking the secrets of so much she does not understand still. Her belongings would probably be confiscated upon arrival, not that she knows where they are now. … It may not be Kylo greeting her when she lands, given that General Hux posted the bounty. While Kylo said he’d “see to it” that she’d be unharmed, she knows that does not apply to his troops (especially if he’s not there). ...

She realizes she’s ruminating for too long, apparently their destination was not far off. Jord asks for the third request code as the ship slows, saying they must be close by now.

Errol clears his throat. “They, uh, changed the third code.”

“What do you mean?”

“The third code is different from before.” There’s a pause. “Should we enter it?”

“Yes, wouldn’t update it if they didn’t want us to use it,” Jord replies. “They changed it because they know we’re here. Don’t want any nerf herder just showing up.”

Rey knows she is running out of time. Errol reads off the new code for Jord to enter, each beep taking Rey a step closer to a whole new set of dangers to interpret and overcome. Static flutters over the speaker as if there’s something rustling and after a short silence she hears a familiar voice.

“Is she alive?”

She imagines the pilots looking over their shoulders in the cockpit, leaning from their chairs to check. She holds her breath, wonders if they can spot her efforts to loosen her binds. There’s a click of a button being depressed and Errol chirps back, “Appears to be.”

“There are two code strings being sent to your receiver. The first is the coordinates. The second is your docking entry for when you arrive. Port 6A.”

The system goes silent and Rey hears one of them rub his hands together. “Almost there.”

The receiver whirrs and the coordinates are entered into the navigation. “Big ship on the radar in that quadrant,” Jord observes. “Think we’re headed to one of their Star Destroyers.”

The _Finalizer_ probably. But she knows Kylo is aware she’s coming, told them where to land. A heaviness opens in her chest as she’s reminded she only has these final minutes to hijack the ship and return to… And return to the treehouses nestled in dark woods with whispers tumbling through the windows that draw Rey from her bed at night to wander the rope bridges. She doesn’t understand why she chooses to lay still, to wait and watch what unfolds —

_Go see._

— — —

Her captors depart the ship after arrival and leave Rey alone in the ship. She cannot hear what goes on outside and trains her focus on her ankles’ binds, feels the ropes quivering to start unwinding from their hold.

She’s startled by clomps of footsteps on metal as two individuals enter and come closer to stop beside her. The ropes are cut and removed from her ankles, a hardened fiber drawing a line across a strip of exposed skin. Her wrists remain tied behind her back as two sets of hands grab her roughly by her upper arms to bring her to her feet. She suspects they’re stormtroopers from the hardened edges of the gloves against her arm wraps, and they push her along to guide her off the ship. Some bright artificial light filters through the fabric over her head but she is unable to discern the details of her surroundings. The lower temperature prickles up goosebumps on her arms and she hears the familiar cadence of a voice modulator beside her when she slows her steps. 

“Keep walking, Jedi.”

Definitely stormtroopers. They push her forward for several more strides and halt as a set of footsteps approach. The sound stops and she tilts her head up despite not being able to see. She realizes Kylo must be close because she swears she can smell him, pleasantly organic in contrast with whatever the First Order uses to clean the floors. The troopers maintain their grips on her arms and a third set of hands come up to her neck to remove the sack from her head.

It takes a few blinks for Rey to adjust to the lighting of the loading dock, disoriented by the stark contrast to the crumbling Imperial Academy. Everything here is sleek and smooth, harsh and cold, metallic and unspirited. She spots the outlines of the troopers’ white helmets in her periphery, biting the inside of her cheek to glance behind Kylo instead of meeting his gaze. There is only one other soldier with the convoy despite the high value & security of her prize; it holds a small black box and walks past Rey’s right to someone standing out of sight. General Hux or anyone else she may recognize from some First Order bulletin is nowhere to be seen.

Rey reminds herself to stay on guard and looks up, frustrated by the nervous flutter in her chest. Something flickers in Kylo’s eyes when he studies her face, but he maintains a quietly neutral expression as he glances down to her nose, to the collar of her cloak, to the line set across her lips. There’s a beat of silence before he speaks.

“There she is.”

Someone clears his throat to her left and Rey can lean forward just enough to see Errol and Jord waiting beside them. The saurin gestures to Rey with an open hand as if presenting an offering. “That’s your Jedi, yes?”

“It is.” Kylo approaches them with his hands behind his back and the third stormtrooper enters Rey’s field of vision with the box. “You may take your leave.”

Jord grabs the prize hungrily to open it, the clasps making an unexpectedly loud clack. The troopers’ maintain their grip on her arms and she cannot lean forward any more to make much of anyone’s faces. But she can hear a bitterness in Jord’s voice that’s sharp enough for Rey to question if he recognizes Kylo, if he realizes he’s speaking to the First Order’s Supreme Leader. 

“This is a third of what’s posted. Is this a joke?”

“You may take your leave,” Kylo repeats.

Rey can see Errol slinking back, hands migrating to his pockets as Jord presses further. The saurin straightens his shoulders and does not flinch. “No way, where’s the rest —“

Kylo steps forward and sweeps his hand out, Jord’s voice dropping to silence. Both individuals are stilled & relaxed, they appear drawn to Kylo’s face as he speaks to them firmly. “You will accept your reward happily. You will forget the coordinates and access codes. And you will leave right now.”

The pair scurry away obediently. Kylo hands the sack to one of the guards who places it over Rey’s head; she groans internally when prodded to start walking blindly again. Rey tries to gain a sense of her location in the ship as she’s escorted down unseen hallways, seeking out patterns in the changing directions of the circulated air to mentally map potential vents. Could be a useful method of escape if needed. It feels like it takes a long while before she is brought to a halt and there’s a pause before the woosh of a door opening. Rey loses her footing when the stormtroopers shove her over the threshold, feels Kylo's hands grasp her shoulders to stop her stumble and guide her back in place. His voice is right beside her when he tells the guards to maintain their posts outside her cell and the door closes.

His hands leave her and she expects him to remove the sack, but instead Kylo paces the perimeter of the room while she stands rigidly waiting for something to happen. Rey tunes her ears to the soft whirring of surveillance cameras, the white noise slight & muted. Kylo’s footsteps cease and she hears the limp fizzle of a camera going dead. His movements resume briefly before he stops to disable another. A stillness hangs in the quieted room for a moment and she doesn’t want to admit that her stomach flips when she feels him come up behind her.

Finally he takes the stupid thing off her head and discards it to the floor. He unwraps the bindings on her wrists silently as she surveys the contents of the room. The small space is clean and white, presumably high security given the closet for a private fresher. A narrow bed is posted just too high on the wall, she would have to bounce a bit to hoist herself up to sit. The ceilings are low and Rey casts her gaze down to a small grate on the floor as Kylo uncurls the final knot. She wriggles her wrists free and brings them up for examination, the skin pink and prickled in several spots.

Reminding herself to maintain her focus Rey turns around to face him — and didn’t quite realize how close he is standing until now. She does not step back to put any distance between them and Kylo takes her wrists in his hands, softly rubbing over the skin with his thumbs. It’s not rough nor is it particularly affectionate, but it is gentle. She looks up to meet his eyes and the silence in the cell hangs heavily between them.

“So you came.”

“Not of my own free will.”

“Yes.” Kylo glances at the door and back to Rey, letting go of her hands. “You’re lucky Hux had stepped out when the first request came through. He doesn’t know you’re here.”

“How could he not know —“

“Don’t mind the details.” Rey sees him glancing towards a couple spaces in the room, where she assumes the silenced cameras lay behind the walls. “There’s a ship waiting for you.”

A… ship? Rey opens her mouth to speak, but Kylo continues.

“We can go now. If you want.” He reaches out to place a hand on her shoulder, letting it awkwardly settle as if she may brush it aside. “Or there is some time to stay —“

Rey stops him to ask the question that runs through her mind as she charts all the places where Kylo had to intervene for her to avoid detection, putting his own reputation at risk were he caught aiding the escape of Snoke’s assassin. She considers the long walk with her face covered, the changed third code, the small number of troops when she landed, the silenced cameras, the —

“Why? Why are you doing this for me?”

The hand on her shoulder squeezes lightly and she tries not to look away from his eyes, tries not to belie how unsettled she feels standing this close. She remembers curling up against him in her quiet treehouse hearing his stuttered breaths in her ears and hopes the blush she feels has not fluttered over her cheeks. There should be more trepidation given that she’s been captured & stripped of her staff, that she’s surrounded by individuals who wish to take her life, and finds it strange she is not scared.

“I’d prefer you not be dead,” he replies, taking his hand away.

Rey looks to his feet on the floor, wandering through her mixed feelings about him helping her escape. Everything she has given him so far has been of her own accord (whether she regrets it or not another matter altogether), and she refuses to be put in a position where he can argue she _owes_ him something — like the Resistance’s location or anything else. Presumably any ship he provides will be tracked, and she tries to formulate an alternate means of escape. But the Resistance has no transport besides the Falcon, Rey doesn’t even know where she is, and she has no comlink to even attempt messaging her allies’ dead networks. There are few options beyond relying on Kylo’s plan, but by the same token his significant efforts suggest that _she_ may be the one wielding more power in the room. His secret depends on her cooperation with so many moving parts and she could easily signal his subversion if she strays. His willingness to reshuffle the circumstances in her favor is intriguing and Rey idly wonders what this could further mean.

There’s something in that realization that makes her footing feel firm, that reminds her she only has herself to answer to now — she alone determines her body’s course. He waits for her to move and she can’t tell if he assumes she will head for the bed or the door, is he that presumptuous enough to...

“Stay for what?” Rey asks with an brow raised, circling back to when she interrupted him. “Why would I want to stay in here any longer?”

He meets her eyes silently and with half a smile, if that’s what it’s supposed to be as Rey is fairly certain she’s never seen him actually try one. She wonders if he finds his thoughts racing back to pressing up against her skin with the vastness of space between them as hers do; she’s not sure whether he stalls for her to take the lead and press whatever it is that’s grown between them. There is this one step they have not taken, and while she may have let him have her through their bond it’s not the same as _really being there._

“You tell me.”

Rey knows she need not steer things in this direction, that she’s already been presented with multiple outs. Yet the recognition of this hold she has over him prompts a warmth between her legs and she is drawn to her capacity to guide what next unfolds. It’s not too unlike his ability to compel the will of others and it may be one weakness he grants to her alone — that he always waits for her to make the first move. 

She reaches her hand out to lay it on his cheek. The reverberation of shared sensation is absent but she can feel his skin entirely and drags her fingers down his jaw. She steps in closer to press her hands to his chest, goes up to bring her lips to his neck. There’s no distance underneath her touch, no intermittent beat of lost sensation between them like through the bond. He’s not laying on the other side of the galaxy but standing right here, with her and within her grasp. She remembers how she melted around him and how there’s no Rose or Resistance around to hear her now. 

She draws her tongue and teeth down his neck while his hand comes up to her waist. She feels a rush in being able to direct Kylo as _she_ sees fit when she’s _no longer_ owned by another…. Her fingers no longer burrow into the dips of scavenged parts to clear out the sand; her knees are no longer red with pressed patterns after crawling over coarse ground; her back no longer lays on the bedroll in her AT-AT. Her body answers to her alone and she presses forward, letting it lead. 

“Why are you doing this for me?” she asks again with a knowing grin.

He fidgets with the messed buns in her hair and closes the distance between them to kiss her. She leans in to deepen it, wanting to taste more of him and the taut energy of the desire & hesitance that unravels between them. She clutches her arms around his neck, caging him in as she kisses back and not letting him respond. This opportunity has presented itself to her, one where someone she’s inexplicably attracted to has offered himself, and there are no noises or whispers telling her she shouldn’t push forward — rather reminding her that there may not be a next time to have him alone like this when he’s truly beside her.

He pulls back from her and his voice comes low. “You already know why.”

He nudges her backwards towards the narrow cot, and Rey isn’t quite sure that they will actually fit there. She pushes herself up to sit on the edge when the metal frame bumps against her thighs then tugs him down to keep her lips roving over his skin. He brings his hands down between her legs, pushing to spread them open and shove his hips closer. His gloves drop to the side of the bed. She can feel him getting hard through the fabric of his trousers as he grinds against her, she reaches forward to rub it before stopping her movement —

_You shouldn’t be doing this._

But she doesn’t stop his hands as they creep up her shirt and below her breastband, shifting his grasp to help loosen it from beneath. She closes her eyes as he grazes his thumbs over her hardening nipples, breathes against his shoulder as she thinks about drawing him inside her. She knows that making this choice means she doesn’t have lightyears between them as her final excuse, she’s crossing any & all lines she could possibly have left and yet….

She presses down on the bulge in his pants and hears herself say “take those off” though doesn’t recall formulating the words. He steps back as if to oblige her before leaning forward to yank down her leggings, coming back to drag her underwear down with them. She kicks them off her ankles after her boots and keeps her legs open as she removes her vest. Her shirt stays on and she stops to watch him stare at her pussy. She brings a hand down to rub over her clit, observing how easy it is to lead his gaze. How easy it is to steer him in whichever direction she pleases. How she has the Supreme Leader of the First Order at her full attention and distracted by her movements. A visible shudder runs through her at the thought.

“Take those off,” she tells him again, her lips parting open as she dips her fingers inside herself and takes them out to draw her wetness over her folds. This time he listens, swiftly removing his belt and coming in closer as he steps out his pants. And despite all her actions that brought them to this point, once Rey sees him hard and ready to take her she cannot shake off that feeling of being outside herself again. She watches as she scoots her hips to the very edge of the cot, lets him push her knees back while he remains standing. She props herself up on her elbows, sees him bite his lip as the tip of his cock presses against her entrance and she closes her eyes again to shake off that creeping feeling under her skin.

_What are you doing_ —

“Rey.”

She opens her eyes when she hears him say her name, pauses a moment before looking up to his face. The flutter of anticipation runs between them as he pushes the tip in and brings it out to rub Rey’s wetness over her clit. She inhales sharply when he does, waits for him to push inside her. But he doesn’t.

“Say it.” There’s a beat before he elaborates. “Say how much you want me to fuck you.”

She has gone past the point of no return, has run out of all excuses. She feels the nub of nerves swell under slicked skin and she knows she wants it, will tell him in order to get it. She’s led them here but he finds this way to gain an upper hand — and she doesn’t really know what to say, but suspects she knows what he’s looking to hear. Rey recalls the redheaded woman in the holovid she kept for two months before returning it to Tanner, her eyes trained to the ground instead of looking to his face and risk being teased into admitting how many times she watched it. In one scene the woman laid on a set table with her legs open, rocking her hips and inviting her partner to come closer. Rey hears the woman’s words leave her lips when she tells Kylo, knowing her body announces it already.

“I want to feel your cock stuffed inside me.” Her cheeks burn brightly when she says it and she looks down to watch him tease her clit. “I want you to fuck me, I want to feel you inside me, please Ben —“

Something darkens in his eyes when she says his name and he pushes into her roughly, pressing her knees back to drive in further. She moans and rocks her hips to draw him in deeper, feeling tightly wound around him from this angle. She clenches her walls around him and feels him as he shudders, murmurs something she can’t hear. 

Rey ignores it and brings herself back up on her elbows, feeling invasive as she stares where he thrusts into her. She sees the shiny glaze of her wetness on his shaft as he draws out, tries not to be ashamed by how heavily she shudders each time she feels him bottom out inside her and press up against where she ends. She feels the same sense of excited bashfulness as she did watching the scene she would return to most, taken closely from a man’s perspective as he entered a woman bent in front of him, and she’s swept into a moan as she watches it happen to her similarly —

He brings a hand up to cover her mouth and stop her from going any louder, slowing down his pace. It’s frustrating she has to mind her volume again, she closes her eyes and thinks back to how her groans would roll over the open desert and echo over the shifting empty sands. She’s startled out of her reverie when he takes her hard, hand grabbing her chin to direct her gaze.

“Look at me.”

She obeys — no, she _listens,_ she tells herself — and meets his eyes, concerned she’s losing control of the situation. It takes concentration not to glance away when he takes her roughly again, sighing into the rhythm of his movement inside her. She wonders what it would feel like through the bond, when they’re so close and she feels so stretched around him bent over herself like this. (She considers if she’s supposed to feel bad, because she doesn’t.) She brings herself in tighter as her breaths become more ragged and she imagines dipping down behind his gaze to unzip the air around them. A tension roots in her chest for a moment, a heaviness grows, and there’s a shift in the air as the room becomes quiet.

Both of them can feel it immediately when the bond opens, gasping at the recognition of the shared sensation at nearly the same time. She bounces up against his cock to chase it further, moaning as he presses up inside her. She can feel how tightly they are bound, how soaking wet she feels around him, how narrow she is when she clenches in hard. There is no muting from the distance between them, there are no spans of lightyears to numb & dim what they feel of the other, the shivering ricochet is right there immediately between them and Rey is desperate to feel more of it — Kylo asks her to slow down, but she doesn’t stop and keeps rutting against him. This time he’s the one to close his eyes and Rey watches his mouth fall open, shuddering before he speaks,

“Ah, Rey, I can’t — kriff, I can’t —“

He pulls out suddenly and comes all over her. She feels it drip down the inside of her thigh, pool on the flat pane of her stomach, and glances down to see a few spots on her shirt even though it’s scrunched up above her breasts. He staggers back from her and turns away to step back into his pants cursing under his breath and refusing to look at her. She stays still for a moment before sitting up to uncrumple her shirt, rubbing the inside of the garment over her stomach to wipe it down. Her face is bright red as she stares at the drain on the floor and imagines dropping down inside it. She feels like she should say something to fill in the empty space.

“It’s… It’s not a big deal.”

He doesn’t say anything. Rey bends forward to pick up her clothing and holds it over her lap when she sits up, staring at Kylo’s back as he faces away. She sees him look to the door and seems to speak to it instead of her.

“Go wash up. We should leave.”

Rey wriggles back into her underwear and leggings, slides down to the floor and guides her boots back on her feet. Counting her breaths she’s brought back to the circumstances of her escape, the fact that she has to leave and there’s no point in discussing the matter further if he wishes to remain silent. Kylo glances back at her as she gets up to open the fresher’s closet door.

There’s a sink and a square fogged mirror that Rey can barely see herself in. Her back is to the room and she opens the drain, watching her fingers shine under the thin stream of running water as Kylo shuffles behind her. She reaches down into her leggings to draw water over her thigh, washes off her hand before bringing it to rub over a spot on her shirt. The door whooshes open and the stormtroopers enter, Rey imagines Kylo raising his hand to halt their progress in the room.

His voice comes low when he tells the soldiers that they’ll forget Rey was ever here and she hears the heavy thud of their bodies falling to the floor in a Force sleep. It’s the second time since she’s arrived that she’s witnessed Kylo take command of the actions & memories of others, something she finds alluringly useful yet deeply unsettling. She dawdles as she wipes her wet hand along her stomach, glazing the water slowly over her skin, and idly wonders if there is a way she could train herself to do that without taking advantage of another or asking Kylo for assistance. But then there’s no way to tell if it’s working.

“Pull open the mirror.”

She looks back to him briefly before returning the mirror, now discerning that its corners are unbolted. She grips the sides to find that it shuffles open easily to reveal a hollow shelf in the wall holding a tightly-folded stormtrooper’s uniform. It seems a little long when she lets it fall open in front of her and she raises an eyebrow while examining it.

“Aren’t I a little short for a stormtrooper?”

Kylo shakes his head. “No. There are uniforms available in your size.”

Or what he thinks is her size. It fits on her well enough, albeit the fabric liners bunch strangely at the ankle and the helmet has a slight bobble on her head. She holds her cloak in a roll in her hand and follows Kylo wordlessly from the room, trying to keep at an even pace slightly behind him and to his right in the same unspoken deference as one of his soldiers. They slip silently through gray corridors and as their footsteps echo off the narrow walls it occurs to Rey that he must be taking her through some sort of back way (a maintenance corridor?) because they only encounter one pair of individuals in a few minutes span. Two humanoid officers, an older man and a young woman in dark uniforms nod their heads to Kylo as they pass. The woman greets him with a thin inviting smile and Rey blames the helmet’s stuffiness for the loopy flip of her stomach, having not bothered to setup the air circulation flow in the interest of saving time.

They stop before a set of black double doors and she watches Kylo enter a code into the keypad to open them. She jumbles forward as she steps up into the elevator, inelegantly hampered by the fit of the uniform. That makes Kylo smile a bit, closest he’s gotten yet at least, and Rey watches her boots as they shuffle into place on the textured floor as the doors close. There’s a tiny jolt before they’re moved and Rey notices that they both stand looking to the exit, not unlike the last time she came to him like this.

“You can stay,” he reminds her.

Rey lets his words settle into the whirring hums of the elevator, tries to cobble together the terms of her denial. It’s strange that he presents his cards so openly like this, that still he tries to reel her into joining him by his side despite her declining multiple times. Though in fairness she did just beg him to fuck her in a prison cell so perhaps he has some grounds to think the matter reopened, and the stark frankness of the thought makes Rey shift her weight on her feet.

It’s strange to hear herself through the helmet’s voice modulator. “You know I can’t do that.”

Kylo furrows his brows. “You can. You just won’t.”

He glances up and down her form, recoiling a step back before returning his gaze to the doors. He does not make any reference to the uniform but it seems to put him off to see her in one. A funny thing at that given how many individuals on the ship have been forced into them. The ride is short and terminates shortly after, the exit opening with a shrill ping.

Kylo turns to his left and Rey mimics his scurried movements down a dimmed concrete hallway that ends in a side entrance to a large open hanger. Exposed pipes and beams run across the high ceilings and there are very few personnel milling about despite the number of ships staged here in various states of disrepair. She follows Kylo down an empty path with tarps and unattended tool boxes laying beside the vessels flanking them on either side. Rey spots yellow and blue marks painted on the the sides of some TIEs; other ships sit with work orders affixed to the entrance hatches; a handful are decorated with plastic red flags that may be a sign they’ll be scrapped. All these scattered parts lay open like puzzles waiting to be solved and her fingers curl to inspect the little pieces and fit them all together, something she would entertain if she had the time & leisure to do so.

Kylo guides her towards the front until they stop beside an AAL troop transporter sporting a freshly-painted blue x and a red flag poking out the side of the opened entrance hatch. Kylo plucks the flag off and enters while Rey remains outside. She shifts her hold on the bundled cloak and hesitates, glancing up and down the abandoned aisle for some other opportunity that most certainly wouldn’t be as viable as the presently available one.

Rey shakes it off and climbs up to enter the ship, removing her helmet as soon as she’s inside. She takes a deep breath in the emptied troop compartment, which is riddled with hollowed storage ports and small hooks to hang weapons. There are few light sources in the boxy area to keep it dim while in flight but Rey spots two small doors, one to the cockpit and another appears to be a shuttered closet to conceal a tiny fresher. She crosses the room to open the door to the cockpit, it’s a little wider than the AAL-1971 model’s and has a single bolted seat that reclines & spins. The systems appear fully equipped and then some and Rey flexes her hands to get them used to the idea of taking these unfamiliar controls (though they won’t be tricky to figure out). Rey hangs her cloak on a hook and places the helmet into storage to relieve herself of the stormtrooper uniform. She slinks out of it and stuffs it into one of the portholes, coming up to smooth down her shirt and itch at the top borders of her arm bands. She looks up to Kylo when he speaks.

“The ship is in good condition. Had it decommissioned and moved down here shortly before your arrival.” He keeps his face still with his hands behind his back, training his eyes to the pilot’s seat beyond the open door. “It’s been routed to bring you to a predetermined set of coordinates. Don’t remove the tracker by the hatch until after you arrive there otherwise you will attract attention.” She sees his gaze settle on an empty narrow space to the right of the radar and makes a note to investigate it in his absence as he continues. “Then you can go wherever you like.”

Rey runs her fingers over some loose strands of her hair and observes that he chooses to stand apart from her, hesitant to make eye contact but looking for options to not make it appear that way. It doesn’t seem right that things are this… simple. 

“So you can follow me to the Resistance’s location?”

“Does it matter? What other option do you have?”

Rey crosses her arms. “I would have gotten out of here _without_ your help,” she replies, confident that this is true. It’s not intended as a dismissal of his efforts but rather a reminder that she’s perfectly clever  & capable on her own. She doesn’t think he doubts it but she’s loathe to let him forget it when he asks about her _options._

“I’m sure.” He steps forward to close the space between them. “So you can skitter back under whichever rock you and _the Resistance_ are hiding under, waiting for your next best opportunity to get shot out of the sky.”

This is not how she anticipated this conversation would go. She glares up at his darkened expression and the tone of her response is more harsh than she plans it to be. “What does it matter if I leave, Kylo? With this…” She huffs and points between them. “With whatever this is I can’t get rid of you even if I wanted to.”

Rey realizes she’s also betrayed more than intended. She didn’t mean for it to be said quite that way, to assign even the most generic words to the longing she felt for him the nights before he reappeared in her bed. _If_ she wanted to. She wonders if he noticed. He probably did.

“Kylo,” he repeats back to her instead.

He doesn’t say anything further but Rey is certain it’s a reminder that she still calls him Ben when they explore the other’s body. It’s not necessarily a conscious decision to do so, instead one that is born of her desire to be wrapped in his arms and not have to feel bad about it. Where she can explore the boundaries of their connection through the Force without the backdrop of having to stay hidden. But it doesn’t seem appropriate to hold on to whatever idea she had of him on Ahch-To, especially he already declined the opportunity to retake the name on the _Supremacy._ She has called him Kylo already on Kashyyyk and isn’t sure why he makes mention of it now.

“What?”

Kylo heads to the cockpit and sits in the pilot’s seat, looking out over the dashboard to the tunnels that spindle into exits from the _Finalizer._ Rey finds herself walking up to stand behind him, laying her hand on the chair’s headrest and looking down to his fingers that rest on his knees. There’s a twitch in his movement and Rey gets that same sense again from before, of her power in the room — it’s as if the escape was meant to impress her and he had not really planned out what to do when she was to go.

He turns the chair to face her. “I didn’t do this just to find your base.”

“Why then?” she asks, returning to the same question as before.

There is no answer. He reaches out to curl an arm around her waist and she lets him take her in closer, doesn’t flinch when he rests his forehead against her shirt. They stand still like this for a few moments as he moves with the rise & fall of her breaths; she wonders if her pulse is as loud in his ears as it is in hers. She isn’t really quite sure what he means. She isn’t really quite sure what to do with this at all.

He murmurs something into the fabric but she cannot hear him.

“What?”

“Let me try again.” His voice is more firm and he looks up to her face. “Before you leave.”

Oh… oh. It falls into place.

Rey hides her teeth with her lips. Again she cycles through her ever-growing list of flimsy excuses to justify how she has not committed a significant enough transgression until being presented with this newest choice. For before in the cell there was the adrenaline of survival from her recent capture and the hurriedness of limited time — As if any of this changes the most basic explanation of what’s already transpired between them, evidenced by the drying spots on her shirt. She’s already let him have her, both through their bond and in the flesh. There isn’t any way to rationalize her way out of this historical fact, no sense in holding onto the illusion that there’s still some line she has not crossed. The opportunity for that has long gone and instead replaced by the knowledge that their bond can be used in the other’s actual presence. There are likely more uses beyond the ones they’ve found already.

A part of her does not want to admit that she is drawn back to how _present_ the feedback of their contact was just now. How it compelled her to rock against him without abandon, without keeping her ears open to his request for her to slow down. There’s a pang of shame that beats through her chest as she feels her body warming with the memory of that brief moment. She reminds herself that despite his efforts to aid in her escape, despite these apparent demonstrations to keep her safe, she’s not supposed to want this. She’s not supposed to want to be clutched in the hands of someone who’s used his for deadly ends. But instead of being repulsed by these considerations (like a normal person would be Rey tells herself), she keeps dwelling on how this monster breathes in her shirt and holds her close.

Rey sidesteps his request with a nod to the controls. “I thought there wasn’t much time.”

“To get here before shift change,” he finishes. “Personnel have higher priorities elsewhere at the moment.” He grazes his knuckles over the fabric of her arm bands, trailing them up to her shoulders. “No one will bother.”

Rey pictures a stormtrooper underneath a tarp removing his helmet to reveal matted hair and an admiring gaze as he watches the female officer from earlier begin to unbutton the clasps of her crisp uniform. There’s a sense of longing and discovery Rey pretends passes between them and she wonders if this is what Kylo means. A small whisper reminds her this could be an elaborate trap, but this place seems too sparsely guarded at the moment for that to be the case. She considers asking Kylo what is higher priority for the mechanics besides a hanger full of incomplete repairs, and instead catalogues it as a bit of information to share back at Kashyyyk.

_Back at Kashyyyk,_ she repeats internally. Since coming on board she has not lost her resolve to leave the ship, despite that small piece of her that bid her to lay motionless in her binds instead using her final moments to escape. She is determined to return to the relative safety of those she knows — she knows _somewhat,_ and isn’t sure what prompts the correction. There isn’t any real reason to tarry. She certainly does not _owe_ him anything she reminds herself and won’t be made to feel she does. But she realizes that while she knows she will see Kylo again, whether welcomed or not, she will not necessarily _be_ with him again — She sees herself rubbing against her hands in the bed of her treehouse, trying to chase the memory of what she felt in the cell and cursing herself for not taking this last chance. The imagining rings true enough to Rey and there’s that sensation of watching herself again when she reaches to a manual latch on the wall to the left of the pilot’s seat. It prompts the open ramp to withdraw and the troop compartment is cast dimly in the lights filtering through from the cockpit window.

She imagines that this time it’ll be less frantic, on a more even footing with the transporter cloaking them in the hanger. Their detached voices can belong to any pair of lackeys relishing a stolen moment to explore the other in the sleeping ships. Her ghost has already slipped away through the hallways and as far as Rey can tell her presence was known to only very few on the ship. She observes the way he stands to follow when she draws away from his touch and backs to a wall, the way he bids to her when she says “come here,” and Rey returns to that irony of how easily she can prompt him without any use of the Force. She leans her back against the wall and lets him loom above her with an arm rested above her head, like a large shadow over her small form. Her lips curl into a small smile when she looks up to him.

“I’ll grant you an exception to what I said. This once.” It sounds silly in her head but she says it anyway, would prefer to frame what she does as something more poetic than sleeping with her enemy. His hands come to her waist and Kylo leans closer to her ear, following the script Rey has pictured.

“Hm?”

“That I already gave you a chance.”

He kisses her on cue and she doesn’t let go, the both of them pressing close and seeking the other’s lips. Rey’s body takes the lead more quickly than she had anticipated, her hands moving over his tunic and up into his hair and down his arms. _She can’t leave without feeling it again,_ becoming more aware of how wet her underwear is beneath her leggings. She doesn’t know how much is from her last encounter or from her recollections of how _present_ the shared sensation was — it had caught her off-guard, not expecting to reopen the bond like she did. The heat of his body so close to her makes her tense up and she becomes self-conscious that he can smell how she hot she runs thinking of him inside her.

Rey recalls the holovid again and tries to mimic the shuffle of another woman’s hips as she draws her cloak, vest, and shirt over her head. Her breastband is still loosened from Kylo’s hands earlier and she runs her palms underneath to stretch it off further. She unravels the wrap from her chest but leaves her arms untouched, looking up to see him following at a similar pace with only his bottom half clothed. His hands run over the cloth along her arms as he lowers down to his knees to take her right tit in his mouth, and she runs her fingers over his scalp even as she realizes he’s licking and… biting her. It’s not sharp enough to hurt beyond a quiet bruise and she doesn’t stop him when he switches to her left, feels his hands come up behind her thighs to grab her ass.

A wet sound is cushioned by the ship as he draws back from her chest and levels himself with her hips. She feels his fingers crawl under the bands of her leggings & underwear and he yanks them down below her knees. There’s no pause of time for Rey to process before he shoves two fingers into her pussy and grazes over her clit with his tongue. She leans back against the wall to maintain her footing and her eyes drift closed as she loses herself in the sensation, running her hand through his hair again and telling him not to stop.

This time they’re alone and she pretends they are truly, hiding inside their transport to steal a moment together on the unmapped region of another place where she’s never been. Somewhere no one recognizes them and they don’t even recognize each other without the cloud of allegiances that always follow. Somewhere or sometime where she can pretend the invasive static of circumstances do not exist and that a distant war is secondary to whatever it is they share. Her breaths in the empty ship echo in her ears and she sweeps herself under this daydream that will never be realized.

She imagines she places her hands on Ben Solo’s shoulders to push him off, kicking off her boots & bottoms less gracefully than she had hoped. Kylo stays on his knees and wraps an arm around her waist to hold her close and Rey shoves him a little harder this time to prompt him to stand. Her hands lay on his chest to direct him backwards as she walks towards him, his expression curious and unguarded when he bumps against the pilot’s seat in the cockpit. She smiles and draws in to kiss his collarbone, pushing him to sit.

He falls into place wordlessly and Rey joins him, face-to-face straddled over his lap and she can see out the front of the ship behind his shoulders. Her hands run over his skin as she wriggles on top of him, grinding over the bulge in his trousers to feel how the fabric presses against her pussy and paying no mind to the spot it creates on his clothes. (“So we’re even now” is used again in her self-deprecating inner monologue.) He leans up to kiss her and she feels his fingers rove up & down the contours of her skin, the angles and shadows of her body, and she just wants to be _closer_ to where they started before.

Rey remembers Kylo’s words from the cell, leans back to lick her lips and smiles. She sees him looking down to watch her rub against him and spins a variation of what the woman on the table said as her partner grabbed a vegetable off a plate. “Take those off so I can fill myself up with your cock.”

He smirks and there’s a moment she wonders if she’s said something strange or embarrassing. She stands to let him shuffle out of his pants, examining him like a well-earned reward. He is as hard as she suspected already, she stays still to watch him palm himself briefly, his other hand reaching forward to entreat her to sit. She feels the slickness she’s spreading on his bare leg when she ruts against him slowly, her breaths growing heavy with anticipation as she runs her fingers down his shaft between them.

She grasps his hand when she lowers back down upon him and sighs into his shoulder, pulls his hair to make him look at her and tries to turn his words back on him. “Say it, Ben, say how much you want me fuck you, how badly you want to be inside me —“

She stops when he bites her tits again, his grip hard enough on her thighs to make her consider whether they’ll bruise. She curves her back to lean into his touch and he pushes his fingers into her again when she lifts her hips; she rocks against them and revels in how slippery it is when she does. His low voice unfolds a shudder in her chest, “I want you to wrap that tight little pussy around me, I want you to bounce on my cock so I can watch you take it all in, so I can split you in half.” He thrusts his fingers in hard when he says, “I’ve wanted to be inside you since I found you on Takodana. _Please,_ Rey.”

She doesn’t know what to make of this unexpected admission — and can’t say it was the same for her, he must be exaggerating — but she’ll take it nonetheless. She swats his hand away, rests hers on his shoulders to hover over him and the head of his cock slips against her entrance when he tries to line up beneath her. She sighs when she settles down on him and presses her face in his neck to smell his hair, to taste the slight salt of his skin, to make sure her sounds pour into his ears. She tries for a moment but her knees have some trouble finding a place on the seat and she takes hold of the headrest to brace herself when she rides on him. They fall into rhythm and his hands run down her back to grab her ass, come forward to direct the bobbing of her hips, press down below her stomach to feel himself inside her.

Rey tries to find the tether of their bond, the filament she could pull down to open it up between them earlier. Their sounds dissipate in her ears and she senses a stillness between them despite not ceasing in her movements. She hears him asking her to warn him and she grasps the link between her fingers, visualizes how she laid her bedroll over the sand in a single fluid motion after she removed it from her pack in an evening’s shelter.

“I’m warning you.”

The warning isn’t quite enough for either of them, and opening the bond elicits a startled sort of sound from them both. There’s nothing lost in the sensations swapped between them and she lets it drag her under. Her thighs start to strain as she quickens her pace, she chases the awareness of how tight she feels to him and lets out a strange strained sound that makes her blush in its immodesty. She hears him ask her to slow down and ignores it, swept in using him for her own ends; she thinks he asks her to stop. She adjusts her knees to fill herself harder but only gets to for a several seconds before he shoves her back, holds hard on her hips to halt her motion.

“I said _stop._ ” And she abides, her rapid breaths slowing down as she looks into his face. He bites his lip and thrusts up into her. “If you keep that up — I’m not — I’m not leaving this ship until you come all over me.”

She clenches up around his cock and whispers in his ear. “Make me.”

He pushes her back to stand and she’s not sure what he intends. He comes around her to return to the troop compartment and grabs her wrists to pull her towards him roughly. She senses the soft plane of her skin against his fingertips when he does. He guides her back to a space in the wall without the hooks, she perks on tiptoes to bounce up into his hands when he picks her up easily and presses her up against the side of the ship. She opens her legs and holds his shoulders, but her back keeps sliding up when he pushes into her and she has trouble keeping her bearings.

Something flickers in Kylo’s gaze and he lets her down, leaning in to loom over her until they’ve both sank to the floor. He tosses the bundle of his discarded clothes behind her haphazardly. She scitters back away from him instinctively as he creeps forward, but she doesn’t protest when he moves over her, caging her in with his arms and with his weight. There’s no pause or shudder of hesitant anticipation, he fills her hard between her parted thighs and sets the pace between them — It’s somewhat uncomfortable on the unevenly spread clothes and she’s partially on the floor in some spots, but it’s not enough to detract from how much more heightened their feedback is when the bond is opened in such close proximity.

She finds herself building quickly despite the dull discomfort of her position, idly wonders if it contributes to it even. She feels the fabric beneath her kneading patterns into her skin as they inch further up on the floor, distracting herself from the discomfort of her tailbone grinding against the surface by exhaling into the mirrored movements as they shudder within her. She pushes down on her hands that rest on his shoulders to draw him closer to her face, his lips stuttering against hers initially. She pulls his hair to kiss him deeply, invites him consume her as she rocks her hips up against him and grazes his teeth with her tongue. He shifts his knees and she groans when she feels how it changes where he ends inside her.

She leans back to tell him she’s getting closer, to fuck her harder, her words dropping over the slippery sound of meeting skin. She hears herself breathing his real name in his ear as she coils like a spring, senses how soaked & tightly wound she is around his cock, chasing the edges of release that builds between her legs like a tide creeping onshore. She’s been denied twice already, in the cell and in the cockpit, and she pants loudly to make sure he can hear her — to make sure he doesn’t stop. She wants to draw him deeper within her, to be filled by him completely, to feel him inside her in every way after waiting for too long.

She digs what she can of her stubby fingernails into the skin of his back and her voice rings loud against the metal walls, “Come inside me, Ben.”

He pulls back to watch her writhe beneath him, scooting her hips forward to tilt up. She steps outside herself and considers her tits bouncing with her movements, wonders what crosses his mind as he gazes down to watch himself fuck her. He leans down to her with a darkness in his eyes like a man possessed and she sets aside the small whisper in her ear that says she should be scared when he looks at her like that. She drags her nails further and moans into his chest as he pushes back deeper, moves down to run his lips against the skin of her neck and mark the space above her collarbone with his teeth. She tells him again but this time her words are less certain, pulled under and into the swells that build beneath her navel and between her legs, “I’m so close, Ben, come inside me —“

She sits up a little when he wraps his arms around her chest tightly, tells him to push her hard just like that and she closes her eyes to close herself from the ship. She’s distantly aware that she’s probably being a little... loud now that she has the opportunity to be, imagines some stormtrooper tallying up a manifest nudging his companion in the direction of her voice. But it doesn’t embarrass her nor does it hold her back when she clutches his arms and tells him she’s there, her breaths echoing in her ears and scattering over the compartment like grains of sand. Her body tenses around him and she feels the rush of her release in her thighs, her pussy hot & wet when she bites down on his shoulder. She briefly floats in this fulfillment of her basest behaviors, devoid of all the inconvenience of their identities like desert creatures rolling over one another in a dimly-lit cave. She’s breathless and her face is red, her thoughts racing with how she’s never felt —

His weight on her startles her from this reverie, he keeps pushing into her hard to reach his own end, rocks back quickly and takes her roughly each time. That same fargone haze is cast in his eyes when he looks down to her lips and licks his own. His hands come up behind her knees to lift her legs up & back to try and fill her deeper; she tries to focus on how her cunt feels stretched around him instead of the unsettling linger of his words as they fall on her ears. His voice is low and shuddered and their meaning shifts the tone into a minor key, his fingers pressing down in her skin when he thrusts into her like she’s an empty vessel, “I’m going to come inside and fill up that tight little pussy of yours, you’re going to take it all in and keep it inside, always so wet and ready for me… You’re mine, and I’m going to _completely fucking ruin you,_ Rey.”

The flicker of determination in his eyes makes Rey think of the anticipation before a conqueror's best & final kill; the darkness of his pupils reminds her of the desert’s monsters as they lunge in to yank their prey beneath the sand. She’s very quickly jolted back to where they lay and a guilt hovers above & within her. There is no quiet sigh of exploration in a stolen moment on a distant planet with Ben Solo — she’s on her back in a decommissioned First Order ship, surrounded by her enemies and opening her legs for their leader after he asked nicely. Despite calling out the name so many times before there is no Ben hiding with her in the transporter, she meets his gaze and the looming understanding that she’s been begging Kylo Ren to fuck her harder and claim her body with his. The disorientation of how wrong this all is (how wrong it should be) confuses the pleasure of attaining her own release.

_What are you doing, Rey_

He doesn’t need to tell her he’s close and he groans when he climaxes, thrusting against where she ends to spill into her. She tightens around him as he does and feels him shiver in response. It pools warmly within her and he stays seated inside her with his hands clutched on her legs as he comes down, as if waiting to move until he’s certain most will not drip outside her. His cheeks are ruddied from exertion and she wonders if the color in her face has drained with the spectre of recognition running through her. A gloom settles below her stomach when she realizes he may have misunderstood her in a very profound and unintended way. She’s about to open her mouth to speak when he slides out of her and sits across from her on the floor. Something passes between them as they silently stare at the other and Rey can’t help but notice how vulnerable he looks naked against the dark metals of the ship. He’s very… pale.

“I shouldn’t have said that.” He glances to the closed door and back to her face, not elaborating on what he means. She watches his eyes flicker down over her form, lingering on the curve from waist to hip, to the plane of skin over her stomach and the pinkened skin between her thighs that shines slickly. “Unwise to tempt things when dealing with something much larger than the both of us.”

She thinks she knows what he means and swears he had already felt the implant in the storage room on Kashyyyk, grazing his fingers up her arms when he asked her to come to him. “You’re being… superstitious.”

“You’re probably right.”

It’s quiet again for a moment. Rey reaches for her shirt to break the heavy stillness in the ship, but stops when she feels Kylo’s hand tug on her ankle.

“Wait.”

She lets the pull guide her and finds herself slinking over to him as he backs down to the floor, bringing herself up to lay on her stomach on top of him. She rests her head on his chest and listens to him breathe, curling in when he wraps an arm around her. The feedback of her skin on his continues to flicker briefly before dissipating slowly into nothingness as the bond closes. 

“Do not disable the tracker by the hatch until you reach the predetermined coordinates,” he says again.

“I won’t.”

They lay for a few minutes before Rey stands to dress, Kylo sitting up to do the same. No words are shared between them when Rey goes to the cockpit, spinning the seat forward to open the hatch and power up the ship. The systems hum as they awaken and the departure procedure crawls down one of the receivers. She feels a gloved hand on her shoulder and leans back in the chair to look up at Kylo’s face. He bends down to kiss her and she lets him, it lasts only a few moments before he pulls back. 

“Be careful, Rey.”

She sits up to watch him walk down the ramp until he slips out of view.

— — —

Rey takes the ship down to idle when she reaches the preset location, standing up to smooth her shirt and stretch her arms. She found some scraps and a writing utensil in one of the inside pockets of the discarded stormtrooper uniform, now stuffed back in a port until Rey figures out what to do with it. The _Finalizer’s_ location was dutifully noted when her vessel exited the Destroyer — it was easy to identify once totally in sight — and she scribbles her current location on the back. There’s a scrapping station tagged on the radar, but it’s too far from her current position to discern any useful details. The tracker by the hatch is easily found and disabled. Rey pops open the casing covering that narrow space to the right of her radar and finds a second tracker as she suspected she would when Kylo glanced there.

She paces the short length of the ship once more before returning to the pilot’s seat to reset the navigation. The buttons stare back at her and Rey considers where she should send the ship, feeling certain there’s a third tracker she’s missing perhaps on the exterior. It would take her approximately 30 hours to reach Kashyyyk directly, but landing the ship there risks bringing the First Order to their location — nothing Kylo has said to her indicates that they’ve given up on exterminating the Resistance as a whole and she does not pretend he wouldn’t take this opportunity to find them.

She can go to another planet in the system and take a shuttle. But she has no credits and the same system is still too close. She tries to ping Finn from the comms system and keeps receiving delivery error notifications. She tries Rose with the same results and it occurs to her she doesn’t have any other codes memorized. No beacon rests on her wrist like on Ahch-To. The Resistance has no idea where she is and who knows what Poe has told them, assuming he stumbled back to camp like her captors expected. What does she even say when she arrives, how can she explain the ship (after figuring out where to park it), and Rey starts cycling through all the details she has to put together for everything to _make sense._

She rests her forehead down on the dash, unfocuses her eyes to make the knobs blur and idly entertains the idea of putting in random coordinates to see where she is taken. Rey pictures sitting across from Leia for another debrief, remembers the nudge into her mind from general assembly, and isn’t sure she can even stomach the thought _now._ She imagines laying in her moonlit wooden bedroom listening to Rose breathe as she sleeps, the soft sounds whispering with the breezes rustling in from the dark worshyrs and the distant crackling of a campfire. She sees Finn’s eyes widening as he stared into the forest, Poe fiddling with the ring on his necklace discussing High Command, Nell frozen at her vigil, Connix biting her lip as she peeks her silent comlink, the bony limb unfurling from the bottom of the wookiee’s fire —

_Do you?_

A pit opens in her stomach when her mind closes the circle and realizes the saber & texts remain under the floorboard. She has to return. There is no other option.

No new dots appear on her radar to indicate visitors from the scrapping station. All remains still and as far as Rey can tell there is no trap set, not here at least. Her body feels heavy, and she considers that Kylo may very well be tricking her and letting her throw herself at him to make it easy to follow. But something about that version of events doesn’t quite fit, he did say otherwise. For all she knows there are no additional trackers and she doesn’t want to admit that she’s disappointed by the thought. She isn’t sure why a small part of her wants him to find her, as if he wouldn’t eventually by popping up at some inopportune moment.

But there is the one thing that sticks with her most. He listened when she refused to stay. He had his chance to take her and let her go. _Helped_ her go. 

She straightens up to set the navigation and stops her finger before pulling up Kashyyyk. She exhales slowly and watches the great vastness of space before her. The ship is quiet, the silence profound, and she has not been alone quite like this since leaving Jakku. She sits back in the chair with her hands on her stomach to gaze upon the endless darkness between the pinpricks of stars and distant worlds.

Rey remembers grazing her fingers over the wilting petals of the desert flowers she collected on their final nights before burying them. Despite all that bound her and held her down back then, she always knew what to do next.

She doesn’t know what to do now. She brings her feet up on the seat and starts to cry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again for every view, kudos, and comment. Yes, I did change my username on here to put some separation between this and other online activities. Hope you're enjoying so far and if you do please share the link and let me know what you think. Have updated the chapter count and we're about to enter Act II of this little story -- plenty of plot AND porn to look forward to ;)
> 
> You can find me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics), come say hi
> 
> Expect update to go up in two weeks, will be posted sooner if completed earlier.


	6. Chapter 6

The worshyrs’ leaves rustle & tangle as Rey brings the AAL low over the treeline to maneuver over a small clearing northeast of the _Falcon._ The ship’s handling systems are a little clumsy, the transporter feeling unbalanced in spots as she drops down through a narrow opening in the canopy. The landing is smooth despite large roots peeking up through the ground in some spots like exposed veins. Rey powers down the ship and cranks the opening latch, her hands running over her hair as she stands. She stops to look out the front of the cockpit into the forest’s endless rows of trees.

Only their trunks are visible at this height, the branches beginning to form a hundred feet up before the canopy tops off far above that. It takes countless years for the worshyrs to scale these heights, perhaps making them older than the Jedi. She hasn’t been to this part of the Black Forest yet, hasn’t been anywhere beyond where the _Falcon_ rests really, though it isn’t far from here. She has not consciously avoided wandering the area, but felt she should not go in without a decent reason to do so. There’s a subdued energy about the place that draws Rey to its whispers in the nighttime hours and as she stands in the ship it flutters through her like a humming white noise. Rey cannot tell if it’s captivating or disconcerting, whether it’s entreating her to explore further or nudging her to leave. It’s the same vibration she’s heard in the silence between words of conversation when walking past the forest’s borders, the same curiosity that halts her during a perimeter check to watch the sunlight filter over the darkened ground.

She turns to leave the transporter and comes to a stop at the top of the ramp. A shot rings in the air confirming the relay tower alerted the Resistance to her approaching ship. The sound dwindles down over the empty forest, the echo fading into a hushed stillness as she waits for the stomps of approaching footsteps. Rey watches as bits of dust & pollen disturbed by her ship flitter through the funnels of light created by the spaces in the thick canopy. The spotlights cast patches of the Black Forest in an ethereal glow, the rest of the area a few shades darker than it should be in the three afternoon suns beneath the towering worshyr trees. She breathes in deeply through her nose to taste the unrecycled terrestrial air, not dry and hot like on Jakku.

Rey descends the ramp and circles the AAL to look for any evidence of tampering. She takes long strides as her eyes dart up and down its exterior, stopping at the nose. A small red light blinks a few feet below the cockpit and she glares at it before reaching forward to detach the tracker. Rey flings it at an exposed root by her feet, the device landing with a dull crunch before she cracks it with the heel of her boot. He didn’t even try to hide it. Rey sighs as she realizes she probably could have taken a once around the ship before following Kylo into the transporter. But she already planned for this possibility. One always had to keep options open on Jakku, plot different locations on a daily trek or double-guess the intentions of cooperative efforts.

She tells herself it’s an unwise decision despite being able to change her mind at any time. She would wait to tell High Command and confront Kylo first. She opened their bond in close proximity before, putting it within the realm of possibility that it can be done long distance too. 

Rey grabs the broken tracker and jogs to the edge of the clearing, keeping the pieces in her fist as she surveys the ground. She drags the bottom of her boot to turn up clumps of moss and crouches down to dig a small opening in the ground with her fingers. A tree limb cracks in the distance and Rey drops the tracker into the hole, tamping the bits of moss back down to obscure it completely. Another branch breaks when Rey stands, giving her enough seconds’ pause that she remembers not to wipe her hands on her cloak. Moist dirt stains in a way sand does not and there’s no good explanation for crawling around right after making it to safety.

Rey reenters the ship to clean her hands in the small fresher, ignoring the brown stripes of dirt wedged deeply below her fingernails. She closes the closet door and listens to the soft rustling of feet along the forest floor, some of the steps more hesitant than others. Rey takes a slow breath as she smooths down her cloak and makes her way outside —

She’s greeted by the barrels of three blasters at the entrance. Poe stands at the bottom of the ramp with Finn and Riva Rosetta, a small brunette tech wearing brown oil-stained overalls.

“Rey!”

Finn drops his weapon first and runs up to grab her into a hug. Rey wraps her arms around him and accepts the tight grip, smiling as she returns his embrace. She steps away and they walk down the ramp, Poe offering a small grin with a nod. He speaks casually but his slightly widened eyes betray a sense of relief upon her arrival.

“The Madam Jedi has returned.”

Poe turns to Rosetta, instructs her to give the all clear at camp. She offers Rey a small two-finger salute as she pivots to return to the treehouses. “Welcome home.”

It’s more warmth than the woman has ever shown her before and Rey is surprised by how Rosetta so freely described this place & these people as her _home._

“Glad you made it back in one piece,” Poe says, slightly shoving Rey forward with a hearty clap on the back. He comes in closer to the transporter, walking over to examine the sides. “Nice find with the AAL too.”

Finn circles over to the other end of the ship, the one with the blue x. He comes to a stop when he looks at it, an eyebrow raised with a look of recognition on his face. He appears to shake it off and chuckles. “Yeah _you’d_ be in multiple pieces if she didn’t make it back soon.”

Poe waves a hand, dismissing Finn’s comment. “We all knew Rey had it covered.” He places his hands in his pockets and returns to the front of the ship, peeking up the ramp to glimpse into the troop compartment. “Let’s catch up on it on the way to camp.”

The sounds of their footsteps seem heavy as they trudge back through the forest, thudding low in Rey’s ears as she watches her friends speak. She reads their lips moving but doesn’t always hear the words, sometimes nods her head and smiles to respond when the entire phrase doesn’t register. That vibrating energy she felt in the cockpit grows into a literal humming in her ears, drawing her glances back towards the ship — to the northwest of the camp, in that same direction Chewie told her not to go. She couldn’t place what it reminded her of before but she knows now.

_She stares into the cave on Ahch-To, the sea swelling up on the rocky shores to kiss her skin with a watery mist — There’s something calling that says she will find the answers she seeks, opening up and inviting her to come down and go see for herself —_

“Forget something back there?”

Rey turns to Finn and shakes her head. “Oh. No. I don’t think so.”

Finn’s steps shuffle as he directs his eyes to the ground, not looking at either her or Poe for the next several yards.

— — —

More Resistance members gather to greet Rey than she expected, welcoming her with smiles and pats on the back; Sharp even punches her shoulder. Rey finds herself surveying everyone’s faces. Many individuals have circles beneath their eyes and most do not maintain the same focused posture that they did when they first arrived at the treehouses. She’s only been gone for a few days but everyone seems notably more… tired. The visible exhaustion makes their small numbers feel more lonely somehow. Rey thinks about how Poe’s acquaintance scoffed at them on Uyter and what someone like him might say if he saw them now.

A few individuals remain gathered by the firepit of the main circle, including Namit, Cicer, and Kuchimba. One woman does not hide her stare as she sits still on one of the oversized sun-bleached chairs. Rey isn’t sure why she is unable to break from her gaze, but the volume of Poe’s voice startles Rey into turning away.

“Yeah I _did_ say she brought a ship, the Last Jedi came back with another trick up her sleeve.”

Rey isn’t sure who Poe is talking to and hopes she’s turned her lips up into a successful smile. She meets Finn’s eyes and signals him to sweep her away from the crowd, but his hands go to his pockets as he nods somewhere behind her. She raises her eyebrows before someone’s touch settles on her shoulder.

Rey does not flinch, turning about quickly to see D’Acy behind her. The individuals around them begin to disperse, heading back to their assignments and nodding to the Commander as they pass. D’Acy’s hand stays on Rey’s shoulder when she says, “Good to have you back.”

Her voice is less cold than Rey anticipated, but she shrinks away from the woman’s touch still. They’ve barely traded words previously and Rey expected Leia to welcome her when she arrived, having mentally prepared herself for the interaction during her quiet journey back to Kashyyyk.

D’Acy studies Rey’s face with a softness in her eyes as she gestures to the treehouses behind her. “General Organa is waiting for you.”

Rey nods and follows D’Acy across the main circle. The woman in the chair watches as they pass and Rey turns her head to avoid her gaze. Rey hesitates at the bottom of the spiraling stairs, looking up at the bottoms of the treehouses and sagging rope bridges as her hand hovers above the railing. She isn’t sure why she hoped things would seem different when she returned, that she would come back with a renewed sense of determination and understanding. Her feet do not feel firm as she follows D’Acy up the stairs, watching the woman’s blonde curls bob on her back as she ascends. It’s disappointing that everything remains the same, but it isn’t enough to distract her from the dread growing in her chest — reminding her to think of absolutely everything and anything besides Kylo Ren during debrief.

The mess hall is empty besides Generals Organa and Ematt, who sit side-by-side on a bench facing a small empty chair. It looks like it will not be another private meeting with Leia, and Rey isn’t sure how much the General has shared about what really transpired on Ahch-To & the _Supremacy_. Rey reminds herself to breathe and presses forward, coming to stand beside the chair while D’Acy sits next to Leia. The sunlight comes through the open windows in a way that casts dark outlines around all three members of High Command. Rey imagines pulling up a blank white screen on a holopad, empty and waiting to be written upon. She bites the inside of her cheek and looks at Leia directly. The General’s expression is warm, but her eyebrow raises just enough to convey a hint of guarded suspicion. 

“Take a seat.” Leia’s open palm directs Rey to the chair. Rey flops down and places her hands in her lap, looking down as she links her fingers together.

“So you went off-world after all,” Leia begins. “I’m sure we have a lot to catch up on.”

Rey raises her head and glances to Ematt, who offers her a small nod of encouragement. She straightens her posture and hears the patter of footsteps passing outside the entrance of the mess hall.

“Yes,” she agrees. “I — I don’t know what happened to Poe after blacking out but can tell you what happened to me.”

Rey gives Leia, Ematt, and D’Acy the same version of events she told to Finn and Poe. She tricked her guards into entering her cell and releasing her, she relieved one of her uniform and used it as camouflage to roam the ship. It was during a shift change and she noticed most personnel were headed in a particular direction, as if they had… higher priorities elsewhere at the moment. She went the opposite way through some maintenance corridors and found a sparsely-guarded shipyard. The AAL was parked and open in a line of recent arrivals. She was mindful of the x, but it passed her inspection and she was able to fly out undetected by using the preloaded departure codes. She hands Leia the piece of paper with the coordinates for the _Finalizer_ and the scrapping station. She assures them all trackers have been disabled, but agrees with Ematt it would not hurt to double check. When asked why she went to Uyter in the first place, Rey went with the explanation that she and Poe previously agreed upon: he told her she had the okay to go.

The meeting goes smoother than Rey had anticipated and her shoulders drop as she begins to relax a little bit. She smiles and agrees that the ship itself is a potential intelligence source, it should have plenty of data for the techs to explore. Leia is silent as D’Acy tallies out who to assign to which aspects of the ship, looking straight at Rey with a small smile.

Rey does not see any evidence of the missing moments and unresponsiveness that Poe mentioned on the shuttle. If anything Leia seems to observe the scene around her with intense clarity, lucid enough to keep watching the small fidgets in Rey’s hands as she speaks. Leia’s quiet perceptive glances are off-putting and Rey’s throat runs dry.

She covers her mouth to cough, feels it when her hand lowers from her lips —

It’s a faint brush across Rey’s forehead, a fingertip grazing over the boundary below the blank slate she created to nudge beneath the torn edge and find which parts of her story will unravel. Rey keeps picturing the white screen and looks away from Leia, shrinking from the woman’s challenge as the intrusion pulls away. D’Acy completes her sentence and Leia claps her hands together to speak.

“Well, Rey, I think we have what we need for now.”

Leia looks to Ematt and then to D’Acy, both nodding in agreement. The General rises to her feet and walks past the chair to the open window, Rey turning about to watch where she goes. “General assembly is in two hours,” Leia seems to say to the scene outside. “We’ll reconvene then.”

Rey still isn’t sure whether to remain seated even though Ematt and D’Acy brush past her towards the exit. Leia walks to join them and Ematt pauses, raises a hand to halt them all as he furrows his brow.

“Rey.” When Ematt says her name it seems to take up all the space in the room. “Until that bounty is down you will not go off-world without High Command’s _direct_ authorization.” Rey opens her mouth to speak but he continues. “It’s not safe for you out there and we can’t have you put the rest of us in danger.”

Leia remains still. Rey looks to her and wonders if she approves of the condescension, this insistence that she stay safe by having to ask for _permission._ The woman’s expression does not change and Rey wants to curl her hands into fists, surprises herself when she imagines levitating the bench and reminding them who is in their midst. Ematt has the audacity to command her to stay when she could have easily not returned at all. Her pulse shifts and Rey realizes… she realizes she’s _angry._

“Caluan.” Leia’s voice is firm and the man visibly shrinks as he steps back. “That’s no way to speak to our Jedi.” Leia chuckles as if there’s no tension in the room. “Rey can handle herself just fine.”

They exit and Rey is surprised she’s still seated, thankful to have some physical bearings when shifting through what just transpired. There was something in the way that Ematt bid her to heed his words that made her absolutely _seeth._ She knows she has a tendency to lose her temper, but this was quick even by her own standards. She looks towards the open window Leia stood beside before. Rey hears laughter in the main circle below, the groan of a rope bridge taking on uneven weight, and a distant treehouse door swinging open.

She remembers that everything she needs is right here in this camp, patiently waiting below the floorboards to be explored.

— — —

Rey is relieved to find her room empty. She discards her cloak and immediately kneels beside her bed, coming down to move the loose floorboard beneath and look upon the Jedi texts and saber pieces. She reaches down to run her fingers over the books’ leathered bindings, wishing it would prod their words to reshuffle into something resembling Galactic Basic.

The creak of a swaying bridge stirs Rey to sit up and she listens to the soft breeze through the open window with her back to the room. The rustling leaves become a loud humming above the bustling movements of normal late afternoon activity around the camp. The echoes of cawing avian creatures and the cracks of settling branches filter through, and it’s as if only the Forest’s noises want to make themselves known. Rey narrows her eyes and places a hand on her stomach, reminds herself to stay steady. To breathe. 

_Still getting used to the unfamiliar sounds all these new planets make._ She physically nods to affirm the internal statement. Rey shifts her weight and swears that a part of the saber has rolled out of its former position. 

She is reminded that here at camp there are few moments alone to concentrate and truly study these skeleton keys into unlocking her capabilities. All her prior misgivings about the living situation on Kashyyyk have flooded back after enjoying the solitary hours on the empty ship, and Rey is quick to remind herself that _she_ decided that this is what’s right. That it’s worth risking her life to make sure this side wins this war. She expected Finn’s presence alone to make the place feel like home, as Rosetta referred to it on her behalf —

_If it is your home._

Rey freezes and her stomach drops, a numbness spreading into a crawl over her limbs. She had not spoken at all, but had heard those words as if they were crafted purely to articulate what she doesn’t want to say aloud — that she doesn’t understand what they’re doing here. Sometimes it feels that (at best) they’re 32 housemates playing soldiers in the woods, waiting for the next best opportunity to get shot out of the sky. But more than the irrationality of the phenomena and its deep beastial tone, it’s the truth of the words that prompt goosebumps to run up her arms.

_If_ it is her home… only if she chooses it to be.

The remainder of the day is spent following expected protocol like a droid. She nods to Poe as he tells her again how happy he is she is safe, and insists on giving her a blaster in exchange for her lost staff. The general assembly is uneventful, with Leia & Ematt mostly quiet while D’Acy read off assignments for the AAL. Rey stands beside Finn as the Resistance gathers for dinner in the main circle of camp that evening, eating pieces of freshly-killed meat cooked on sticks over the fire. It’s more rare than she expects when she gnaws into it, nodding aimlessly at Finn as he tells a story to a mechanic whose name she’s already forgotten. Some individuals share drinks from a fur-covered flask but Rey abstains. Her stomach is unsettled and she wants a moment away from all this forced camaraderie, excusing herself to retire early after so many hours on an uncomfortable chair.

It’s early enough that Rey is alone again in the room, having made it before Rose returns. Rey lays on her back on the bed, looking up at the wooden ceiling. She doesn’t know what creates all these contradictory feelings, whether she’s weighing her own thoughts & intentions or the musings of others. But whatever it is she’s certain she will find more in the Forest, where she felt the tendrils of something reaching for her to come closer. It’s the thing this place has been telling her to do ever since she got here.

The maze to unleashing her potential begins in those woods. She can feel it.

— — —

Rey sleeps late a couple hours past dawn and finds Rose already gone from their room when she awakens. She eats her portion of morning rations alone in the mess hall, stares over at the bench where Leia sat the day prior. Rey is relieved to have her relay tower shift alone, the usual second scout redirected to mine data from the First Order ship. Rey watches figures cross the clearing from the main circle of camp into the surrounding woods and feels more at ease than she did the day before. An actual night’s sleep on a horizontal bed reminded her that these individuals have shown her a kindness seldom few have before.

But as the hours stretch on Rey keeps finding herself daydreaming about her secret she cannot share, imagines a fullness between her legs that makes her clench up and rub her thighs together at times. She exhales softly as she remembers the way she sank onto Kylo in the AAL’s cockpit, his large hands coming down the sides of her body to guide her hips. She lets herself fall open and grazes her knuckles over her heated slit through her clothes, biting her lip and hiding her hands as she stares out the window for passing ships. Rey cannot decide whether she dwells on Kylo for the wistful possibility that she may have been right about him turning after all… or whether she’s just smugly satisfied that he provided her a means to her own ends. She fucked him and flew away. The thought makes her smirk.

She stops her hand’s movements when she sees Rose wave to her from the field below. Rey waves back and feels her face flush, thankful that the woman is rather far away. She sees Rose greet someone else in the distance and Finn crosses into Rey’s line of vision to approach Rose. He reaches out and lays a hand on Rose’s waist, leans down to give her a quick kiss on the lips before pulling away. Rey raises her eyebrow and leans up from the window. That’s new.

It reminds her of the broken tracker buried beneath the moss. She led the First Order straight to Finn almost 24 hours ago and hasn’t said anything yet. She has not yet determined what to do about this _complication_ to her current circumstances, not expecting a couple ill-made decisions in her quiet bedroom so quickly escalating to their location being found. Which wouldn’t have happened if she had stayed on Kashyyyk as instructed, if she stayed curled up under her covers at dawn instead of going off-world with Poe. Rey shakes her head and prods herself to remember that this should be an easy call.

But her scavenger’s instinct insists she not fold these cards quite yet. She remembers the rise and fall of her chest when Kylo breathed in her shirt. It could be something used for her advantage. She’ll sleep on it one more night.

Rey spends the last hour of her shift looking down upon the swaying trees and only once does she hear the voice that’s called to her these days prior —

_Go see._

— — —

Cicer comes up to the tower to relieve Rey of her duties, nodding curtly as she exits and glances down at the dirt caked all over his trousers. Rey’s fingers glide along the rope bridges as she walks to the nearest staircase, giving her enough bearings not to be startled when Connix exits the barren sitting room to block her path.

“Rey. Just the Jedi I wanted to see.”

The Lieutenant’s smile appears friendly, but the corners of her lips stretch just enough to make it fall flat and false. Rey wonders what the woman was doing with the empty bookcase & weathered floor, and one particular consideration looms in Rey’s chest and sinks down into her knees — Connix was _waiting_ for her.

“Hi Kaydel,” Rey greets with a forced grin. “Was just on my way to training.”

“With Finn?” she asks.

Rey cocks an eyebrow and begins to walk. “Yes. By the clearing as we always do.”

Connix nods and clasps her hands behind her back as she walks beside Rey, following her lead as she guides them towards the stairs. “Yeah, I’ve seen you two practicing before.”

Rey listens to their steps sag down the rope bridges they walk upon, she imagines looking up under them to see them sway beneath. Rey isn’t sure what to say and waits for Connix to speak.

“So that ship you brought has been a great source of information. We were able to access troop deployment schedules, maps of prior movements, some encrypted entry codes, really useful stuff.” Connix lets her words trail off and Rey sees her glance over in her periphery, as if expecting a response.

“That’s great.” Rey makes a conscious effort to look Connix in the eye, reaches out to grab hold of a railing as she begins to descend the spiral stairs. “We can use everything we can get.”

“Absolutely,” Connix agrees, coming down behind Rey on the steps and speaking to her back. “Whoever gave you that ship didn’t even bother to erase any data.”

Rey’s breath stops when Connix’s implication registers, recalls how the woman’s eyebrow raises just slightly when trying to convey something unsaid. Rey watches the pace of her own steps as she takes another stair, relieved not to be facing Connix at this moment.

“Not sure if a find qualifies as a gift,” Rey replies, hoping that the traces of hesitance she feels is not coming through in her tone.

“A find,” Connix repeats. “Saw it marked for decommission and you said it passed your inspection?”

They reach the bottom of the stairs and Rey walks ahead a couple steps before turning to face the lieutenant. The woman’s facetious tone is growing tiresome and Rey realizes she should uncross her arms as to not appear defensive, moves to do so as she affirms the statement. “Yes. The systems are in working order.”

Connix nods and her hands retreat behind her back again as she comes down the landing to join Rey. Connix looks back up to the treehouses and sighs, as if seeking out the words she wishes to say.

“So of all the ships you found in the line of recent arrivals, you took the one that was coded for a catastrophic mechanical failure less than 80 minutes before the estimated time of arrival you gave to High Command.”

Rey doesn’t want a moment of silence to pass between them, but knows she needs to choose her words carefully. “I didn’t check the status codes before taking off. I should have. Could have been a fatal error. It was a quickly-made decision, but one that seemed right at the time.”

“Understood. Not all of us can rely on the Force to guide our way.” Rey opens her mouth to speak, but Connix clears her throat and continues. “A fortunate coincidence, your AAL came back from a successful personnel transport earlier that day. Gets sent to dock, coded for departure the next day, and then — boom — catastrophic mechanical failure. Bypassed inspection, sent straight for scrap.”

Rey presses her lips together into a single line. She had spent a long time debating whether to wipe the AAL’s data in-flight, but decided it would be too curious to return with a cleaned ship when the Resistance is so desperate for any scrap of useful information. She glances down to the ground without realizing it, her own hands going behind her back to mirror Connix’s posture.

“I’m as surprised as you are that they’d scrap a ship before even bothering to inspect it.” Rey cannot tell if Connix is being sarcastic. “But what I’m not understanding is why you’d keep a high-ranking mole to yourself.”

“Mole?” Rey asks. “What do you mean?”

“Whoever gave you the ship.” Connix shakes her head. “The decommission codes were entered under a generic official orders handle. A manual entry, not system generated. With so many cogs in their machine I doubt every First Order officer has access to that account.”

“Kaydel.” Rey tempers the edge in her tone, but doesn’t want her intentions lost. “No one gave me the ship.”

“Rey.” Connix raises her eyebrows as she crosses her arms and straightens her posture. “Why did you wait for 178 minutes before entering the coordinates for Kashyyyk?”

Rey can see what Errol meant when he said Connix plays to win.

“I used the loaded departure codes to get off the _Finalizer_.”

“Yes. But that’s no reason to follow them for that long.”

Rey cannot provide the real explanation without betraying insider knowledge, cannot tell her that rerouting earlier would attract attention to the ship. Instead she shakes her head and brings her hand up to adjust the buns in her hair.

“Look. Rey. I understand if your contact doesn’t want us reaching out, swore you to secrecy. But if there are more sympathizers, more Finns, in the First Order then that’s something for High Command to know. I get you’re new to this whole —” She gestures towards the meeting circle, sweeps her hand up towards the treehouses above. “— this whole Resistance thing. I’ve kept these… _data points_ to myself. But you should go to General Organa and let her know these next few days, I’m sure she’d prefer to hear it from you than me.”

Connix pauses to make sure Rey is listening, with soft eyes but stern lips. Leia will have a reasonable guess of who gave her the ship and Rey does not want that line of conversation pressed any further, especially outside her presence.

Connix glances to look to the clearing beside the meeting circle where Finn mills about, twirling two practice staffs in aimless maneuvers as he shuffles his feet. She nods towards him and asks, “I’ll walk you to training?”

“Sure.” Rey crosses her arms and takes long strides to distance herself from the woman. She does not want to appear to be running even though that’s all she wants to do.

“Rey,” Connix calls after her, jogging to catch up as they cross through the main circle of camp. “Look, I like you, and having a Jedi like you on our team — it’s a great asset to the Resistance.” Connix pauses as Rey slows her steps. “I don’t want you disciplined for inadvertently concealing potential intelligence, that’s all.”

“Discipline me,” Rey echoes. “When I’m already not permitted to leave.”

There’s mirth in Connix’s chuckle, as if she recognizes the hollowness of her words. “It’s nothing personal, I promise.”

“Understood.” Rey stops and turns to face Connix. “I think I can take it from here.”

She nods and offers Rey a two-finger salute, just as Rosetta did when she disembarked the ship. “May the Force be with you.”

Rey hears no retreating footsteps as she walks away from Connix to close the distance with Finn, knows that the lieutenant is watching her leave. Aside from the backhanded claim of kinship, there are two words hanging heavy over Rey’s mind, as if they have come to define her role in this new place.

_An asset._

Finn tosses a training staff to Rey with a broad smile as she approaches. “Catching up with Kaydel?”

“You can say that.” Rey looks back over her shoulder to see Connix walking back to camp.

Rey & Finn walk out a little further and take their steps away from each other. Rey sweeps down, bends her knees into a starting position and waits for Finn to take his stance. He stands in place, grinding the end of his staff into the ground.

“We haven’t really had a chance to talk since you’ve come back.” Finn glances back to the treehouses briefly. “Talk alone, I mean.”

Rey straightens up and swings her staff around to keep her hands busy. She decides to set the pace of conversation, move it away from her time off-world.

“I saw you and Rose up in the relay tower.” Rey waggles her eyebrows suggestively and giggles. “What else did I miss?”

“Heh, yeah.” Finn scratches his head, a sheepish grin crossing his lips. “There’s that.”

“What else?” Her faces lights up expectedly, eager to have something new to discuss.

But Finn’s smile fades, his expression more grim when he looks up to face her. “How did you really get off the _Finalizer?_ ”

Rey sighs, stepping backwards and holding the staff behind her. She’s not sure she can handle this again so soon. “What do you mean?”

“The story you told Poe and me. I understand you don’t want him to know, he’d never keep it quiet, we know how good he is at taking suggestions.” Finn ceases fiddling with the staff and Rey can see he’s biting the inside of his cheek, as if unsure how to say what he is thinking. “I’ve spent… a lot of time on that ship. If personnel were being redirected for assembly then a single stormtrooper going the wrong way would get turned around.”

Rey cocks her head to the side, unsure what he means.

“Patrols are always in pairs,” Finn continues. “Someone would have directed you to assembly if you were walking that way alone. Either through the helmet or the loudspeaker. Cameras everywhere.” When he meets Rey’s eyes this time, she notes a hint of… concern. “And decommissioned ships aren’t — it wouldn’t have been with recent arrivals, would’ve been sent directly for inspection and breakdown. The staging area is towards the middle of the ship. Those corridors are code-locked.”

Rey bites her lip as she folds her arms across her chest. She knows he’s going to ask and she’s not prepared to lie at this moment, a hardness winding in her chest at the thought of deceiving her one true friend here. She can’t do it. At least not entirely.

“Finn —”

“Did Ren get you off the ship?”

Rey covers her teeth and closes her eyes briefly to gather herself before breathing her response, low but not quite a whisper. “I… I’m pretty sure he let me go.” She looks over Finn’s shoulder to the entrance of the dark forest behind him, notices how the dirt paths wind like bits of ribbon. “He must have known I was there. Only three troopers to present the bounty and escort me to the cell. Security seemed a little… low.” 

Finn nods, brings a hand to his chin. “And the ship just there. With arrivals,” he repeats, but he does not press further. “What did you say to —”

“I think Leia already knows.”

It’s silent for several seconds and Rey walks up closer to settle a hand on Finn’s shoulder. “Look. I’m okay.”

“And back home in one piece,” he replies. “That’s what counts.”

That word. Again. She steps outside herself, considers how it is _wrong_ to mislead her only true friend here — it’s cutting in a way that’s different from fibbing to Poe or High Command. This is Finn. They have a familiar exchange of words.

“You promise you’d tell me if you were in trouble?”

“Of course, Finn. I wouldn’t keep that from you.”

— — —

That evening Rose does not mention anything about the night before Rey went off-world, nor does she press her to discuss what happened on Uyter and the _Finalizer._ Their light conversation is a welcome reprieve after attempting to quell so many suspicions that day, even though it’s mostly retellings of the same events Finn related to Rey earlier. Rose tells her how Finn kissed her when they reached a scenic vista on a hike through the eastern mountains. Chewie brought more biscuits from Malla. Fourteen people overslept two days ago. The night before Rey came back most of the camp was woken up by naked Cova Nell screaming at the main circle’s firepit. It took three people to shake her awake from what they assume was a night terror. 

High Command held a general assembly when Poe came back from Uyter, forced him to stand in the middle of the meeting circle and admit to the entire Resistance he lost Rey. He wasn’t rebuked nor disciplined publicly, the humiliation of having to tell everyone he mishandled one of their most valuable _assets_ considered punishment enough right then. Rose and Finn saw him walking into the forest alone under the cover of darkness, not terribly long before the episode with Nell. Rey asks if Leia talked much during the assembly. Not as much as usual, no. D’Acy had to call her three times before she answered at one point. And when she did answer she said something about sending a message to Han Solo.

Rose leaves Rey to visit Finn, but does not say where. She bids Rey goodnight with a small wink and jokes that she should wait on the bridge to see if Poe needs any company on his nocturnal adventures. Rey laughs and says she’ll likely sleep early, still feels unrested from the days prior. She watches the closed door for a few moments after Rose exits, sitting on her bed with her hands on her knees and waits for a later hour to put her plan in motion.

She unearths the Jedi texts from beneath the floorboards, sitting cross-legged on her bed and thumbing through the pages as early evening dims into nighttime. Her attempts to focus and meditate are consistently unsuccessful, sidetracked by ambient noises outside. A couple hours march forward before the camp’s sounds become hushed whispers as individuals settle in for sleep, and Rey does not leave until the third moon creeps above the southern treeline.

Rey does not change her clothes or throw on her cloak, heading directly to the storage room for a quiet space to attempt to open the bond with Kylo. She crosses the first bridge towards Cova Nell & Koo Millham’s treehouse, notes how the light from their open window cuts across the landing like a targeted beam. She hurries past and glances in, curious to peek at Nell again after hearing Rose’s story —

Rey stops, takes a couple steps back to confirm she really did see —

Nell’s bed is visible from the window and the dark-haired woman lays on her back, completely nude with Millham’s head between her open legs. One of Nell’s hands yanks Millham’s dirty blonde ponytail and the other digs into the woman’s shoulder as Nell groans with her closed eyes directed to the ceiling. Millham’s opened flight suit gathers down around her waist and Rey can see light scratches on her exposed back.

Yes. She really did see that.

Rey isn’t sure why she’s drawn closer, why her feet bring her to the open window instead of scurrying away. With all the lights on in the room Rey can see the shine of sweat on Nell’s forehead, the plumped pink of her bitten lips, the bobbing of Millham’s head when one of Nell’s legs starts to shake. Nell’s heavy exhales roll into soft moans as she shifts her hips, sighing when Millham’s hands clasp her thighs. Rey stills her breaths and her cheeks feel warm, flushed by the knowledge that she should not intrude on this private moment these two women share. But she cannot draw her eyes away from her intimate discovery, and cannot deny the heaviness it prompts inside her.

Rey shivers with the memory of that chilled desert evening, gathering her cloak over her shoulders as she sat behind a sandy mound to watch the humanoid woman with yellow hair and straight hips for the first time. Rey returned occasionally over the eleven months this scrapping contractor pitched her tent on Jakku, almost always seeing her entertaining a partner — always female, though the species would vary. Rey was certain the woman knew she was there after a point, at times questioned whether she did certain things for show. Rey never learned her name, but imagines her bright hair pulled up in Millham’s ponytail. There are no sounds of impending footsteps and Rey shifts her weight, her leggings feeling too close to her skin. She shudders silently as she drags her thumb over the hem of her pants and lets it wander between her thighs, taking her hand lower as she leans in closer.

Nell opens her eyes and looks straight at Rey through the window. She smiles and grabs Millham’s scalp hard, squeezing her own tit with her other hand. Her mouth opens and her words come out unnaturally, far lower and guttural than the woman’s usual voice,

“Come here.”

Rey is too startled to respond, leaning into the room to slam the shutters closed before hurrying away. They don’t lock in place as she does it from the wrong side and Rey glances behind her to see that beam of light grow back over the landing as the window drifts back open. She brings her hand over her chest to feel her rapid heartbeat as she bolts towards storage, unable to sort between being so aroused and so unnerved at the same time. Rey thinks back to the words she heard in her treehouse the day before, trying to work some connection between the voices’ cadences & inflections but unable to come to any conclusion.

Rey does not turn on the lights as she enters the windowless storage and latches the door’s lock, cursing when her shin hits a crate’s corner as she crosses the room. Rey reaches her hand out to find a wall, walks up slowly and gains her bearings. She leans back against it and comes down to sit with her legs stretched in front of her, adjusting her vision to the darkness. She exhales slowly in this solitary refuge, calms herself and questions what it is that’s scaring her. She shuts her eyes and sees Nell & Millham again, hears her own soft footsteps as she approached the open window. She knows her wandering hand was considering Nell’s offer before it was even presented.

Rey reminds herself that she came here with an actual purpose, to attempt to open the bond and ask Kylo about the tracker. But she feels a tightness in her chest and draws her knees up close, having intrusive thoughts about both the excitement of watching the two women and the way Kylo caged her in on the transporter’s floor. Rey stares at the wooden wall across from her and the room is hushed & quiet in the darkness, the camp shut out from this small private space where she can barely even see herself. She sighs and thinks back to when she locked eyes with Kylo in the cell and blushed as he bid her to tell him what she wanted. And at least here in this empty room she can let the memory unfold into fantasy, give herself some moments to escape the raised eyebrows and curious glares around her.

There are a few moments before she realizes she’s grazing her knuckles outside the crotch of her leggings again, pressing them in to brush the fabric over the pull starting to pulse in between. Rey bites her lips when she pushes against her clit, nudges herself to go forward and sigh with the thought of what she wants… alone in this dark haven where she can only hear her own breaths, left without any visual reminders that she’s supposed to feel guilty for all of it.

And so her hand winds down beneath her leggings and the border of her underwear, she lets it drop into her cunt to feel the slickness gather under her fingers. She drags her index finger up, the one with callouses along the side of the pad to rub it over her clit. She spreads her wetness over and shudders into her movements, the roughness of her finger peeking through and making her legs tense.

Rey huffs as she takes her pants down, shuffling her ankles out and reminding herself that she locked the door. She lays the leggings before her feet and her underwear soon follows. She straightens her back against the wall and her legs spread & fall down around her, opening for no one’s touch but her own. She hums briefly as she sorts through her various prior scenarios, settles on the most perilous of them all. She finds herself replaying the events from the _Finalizer,_ and one thigh quivers when she shifts the pads of her fingers, the staticked reverberation of the changed sensation running down  & through her.

— And it makes her feel ashamed to think about how hot it makes her, even now when she’s alone in this dark room aware that no one will ever know she thinks about _him_ spilling his darkness inside her, holding her legs to make sure it stays in place —

_Come inside me, Ben_

Rey lets herself eke outside a stifled moan and finds herself saying his name when goosebumps run up her arms & down her calves. The air in the room is hushed and hanging, low inside her and all around her. She wouldn’t need to try to force the bond open after all. She glances around and cannot see Kylo in the darkness, curls two fingers deep inside herself to draw out her voice. After spending so much time today having to _hide_ she wants him to _know_ what he hears, that the Force really has brought them together when she’s stretching her own pussy and breathing his name. A shiver runs through her despite the temperate climate, elicited by the knowledge that she’s being watched but she does not know from where.

_What are you doing —_

“Rey.”

When Kylo says her name everything stalls in the room. Everything dims but for the tiny slick sounds of her roving hand; there’s a small creak as she shifts her feet to further open her knees. She hears his breathing harden in her ears, becoming less focused as she continues attending to herself. It’s as if he forgot how to breathe altogether before thinking to say,

“Don’t stop.”

She thinks she can see the silhouette of a form sitting in the far corner of the room, hands in front as if directing controls. She turns to face it, biting her lip as she stares through half-lidded eyes. She wonders if she’s cast in darkness where he is, if he can only see the suggestion of her hands’ movements and can feel her desire thickening through their connection as she can sense his. Rey rushes her hips forward to grind into her wet fingers, having trouble gaining traction as she keeps trying to stimulate herself externally. Even her own hands seem so far away.

“Ben,” she exhales, closing her eyes and dismissing the little voice that tells her she’s being foolish, making herself vulnerable and weak. “Where are you —”

Rey gasps as a foreign sensation pumps up inside her, an unexplained entrance of two long & familiar fingers. It doesn’t quite hold the correct form, as if blurry & blotched along the outlines, but the resemblance is close enough. She brings her thighs closer together and there’s a strange absence that runs through her when she tightens around nothing at all.

“You — You can feel that?” He sounds surprised.

The shape pushes in harder when he asks. Rey’s chest sinks as she feels a grazing over her mind that she doesn’t push away, and she clenches up when the sensation curls up inside her just as she did to herself before.

“Yes I feel —”

There’s a pressure in her clit detached from her fingers roaming over top and her words catch in her throat, her breath taken out from beneath her. She shudders, her legs falling open again as the pressure builds up & slinks down, slipping over sensitive skin and pushing up inside her again. The form is thicker this time and even though it’s not positioned correctly to come up _there_ she lets that light brush into her mind again before it presses up right where she needs it most. Rey loses her tether to where she is, her voice picking up in volume despite not being able to see whether anyone stands outside the windowless room.

“And that,” he muses aloud, as if entering data into an experiment log.

“Yes — yes, I can —” And she doesn’t stifle the heated edge of her stuttered exhale, lets it curl down into a low moan when the form shoves up to hit that spot again.

She pieces together that he’s peeking into her mind to find where to go, probably has been all along, and she’s momentarily concerned that she didn’t notice until this night. She idly wonders if this is technically a dishonorable shortcut but doesn’t really care if it is. Rey dips her fingers back inside her pussy, draws them in and out as he does the same with the form within her. She can feel her hand presently and immediately while the phantom sensations are muted and distant, dwelling on the novelty of these conflicting & comingling forces filling her. Her nose scrunches when she _hears_ her slide her fingers out at a point, inhales sharply when he directs a rough thrust deep up inside her.

She translates her desires into words again, a light breathlessness at the ends of her phrases. “I want to come all over you,” she whispers, aware of the locked door in her periphery. “Let me over and bounce on your —”

“No.” His answer is flat. “Not — not right now.”

Her fingers rush circles on and around the nub of her clit, she adjusts her feet on the floor and repositions her knees. The figure in the room shifts its weight in an unseen seat. Rey sighs and rests her head back on the wall to look up to the ceiling, feeling that tension building up within her.

“I’ll come right over and sink down on —”

“No. I’m flying.”

How is he flying right now? “Just bring the ship to idle.”

“But you’re… You’re perfect right now. Just like this.”

The curiosity in his voice gives her pause. There’s a silence when something passes between them, and Rey feels a rush of heat along her cheeks when she realizes he _likes_ having her like this. He _likes_ finding her buttons and making her ask for his cock, watching her be completely under his control. She hesitates to grant him this power, questions her prior reading of their dynamic on the _Finalizer_ — The sensation comes back up into her clit to draw more sounds from her throat, and the darkness of the room gathers up and around her as the pressure in her mind bears down further.

She looks to see the figure move something on an unseen dash, it leans back and both hands are off the controls. One reaches towards her and this time she feels the darkness of the room run into her, over her, through her. Her mind peels open just slightly. Rey clenches up as she brings herself closer, shudders with every push of the detached sensation to let him know she can feel his manipulations inside her. She finds herself lost somewhere between being fevered with stimulation and being ashamed of letting him control her. She shuts her eyes and relaxes her shoulders, feels another brush against the boundary of her mind. She tastes his skin on her tongue and the humming from the forest pours into her ears. She sweeps away her resistance and opens her lips, letting Kylo and his darkness fall in —

_He stands behind her in the relay tower, looking down at her as she sits by the open window. She stares out over the clearing & treeline, her hand idling between her legs as she closes her eyes._ … _He sees her piecing together the existence of their shared sensations, pausing in her path around the perimeter to dismiss her curiosity about what it’d be like to fuck him through their bond._ … _He sits up in Rey’s bed to look around her room, gaze settling on Rose laid on her back with a hand above her head. He leans forward towards the moonlight coming through the open window._ … _He watches Rey’s closed eyes as she bounces up against his cock in the cell, her shirt rolled and bunched up above her breasts, her pussy tightening up around him before he asks her to slow down._ … _He watches Rey glance back to the treehouses towards a pair of individuals poring over a map at the main circle of camp._ … _He sees her breathlessly remembering when she asked him to come inside her, rubbing her own wetness over herself before he appeared in the storage room._

Rey becomes more vocal as the darkness winds her to the ground, her legs and pelvis feeling heavy as if she’ll sink down and through. Her eyes widen as it dawns on her that he can see everything in these moments and that gloom opens in her chest when she realizes —

He can see her surroundings. And he can see what she wants him to do next.

Kylo withdraws from her memories and his, and Rey turns to watch his dark figure sitting in the corner, her body writhing beneath her own touch as she’s tugged closer to completion. She cannot discern the position of his hands, but can determine he’s still leaned back and working to pace his own breaths. Rey tunes her ears for movements outside the closed door as a clutching sensation creeps over her shoulder and up the side of her neck.

“You like that.”

He says it as a statement. He already knows. Rey nods to affirm and closes her eyes as the pressure encloses her neck. All at once she’s pressed hard against the wall, the room seems to lower all around her, and a strangled gasp is drawn from her throat. Her ass is lifted just slightly off the floor, the choke pinning her back. It’s not soft like in her treehouse before, nor is the thrust of the form that shoves up inside her. Her lost breaths cast a dreary haze over her senses, bringing her focus to the heightened warmth between her legs as she tightens up. She opens her eyes and glances down to her hands when she’s granted some seconds for air. A flutter of panic runs through her chest when she realizes they’re not entirely within her control, her own intentions being guided by a dark cushion beneath them dragging them forward.

“You came to ask me about the tracker.”

She watches her left hand press down and inward, pushing three fingers up as friction against the detached sensation that makes her feel full. She lets him bring her right hand up under her shirt to press and rub over her nipple before leading it back down to flick and circle her soaked clit. There’s a heavy realization that brings the haze down farther, that she’s willingly granted him entry to her mind as well as her body — And for a brief moment she is scared.

“You flew to Kashyyyk.”

He releases her to prompt words from Rey that are not her own,

“Ben, where are you — Please, _please_ let me have you.” Her face is flushed from the rush of air filling her lungs as she speaks, and from how oddly funny it is that this is what he wants to hear. “Please come to me, I need to have you inside me —”

“Your memories confirm it. You didn’t even try to throw off the trail. Led me straight to you and your friends, playing soldiers in the woods.”

She feels a prickle in her throat when he uses that phrase from her own internal musings. She’s pressed up against the wall again and Rey closes her eyes as she ruts up on herself & on the thickened form hitting up inside her. The disquiet in her chest unravels into assent as the darkness creeps through her veins, allowing herself to fall into the strangeness of the confluent penetration and just _feel_ everything building inside her. 

“It’s close to Balamak, where I’ve graciously volunteered my time to help organize containing the insurgents there.” He pauses. “Not because I’m concerned with that, but because there’s something very special nearby.”

It’s easier than she thought it would be to detach from the unsettled regret, from the looming realization she’s handed her enemy a map — from the scandalized gasp of her conscience reminding her not to run towards the darkness sinking her down. But it feels so kriffing _good._ He sits up to lean forward into the room.

“There’s a little Jedi, shaped by desert sands, who’s been thinking about running into the forest to find what’s calling to her there. Sound like anyone you know?”

His tone is smug when he asks, but there’s a shudder behind his words as if unsure how to choose them. Rey feels herself beginning to fade as she loses her hold on the treehouse floor….

“She won’t come to me, but hasn’t told her friends about the tracker because she wants to be followed. All alone with the trees, her tight little pussy so wet and ready for me.”

But she does not think he can sense her slickness now, he did ask if she could feel him earlier. She wonders if he can hear it instead like she can, in the moments when her movements make a soft sloppy sound in her portion of the room.

“I can see her right now, under a gray glow outside the window, a little beacon hanging in the emptiness of space.” It sounds… odd. “Letting me watch her play and play with her pretty cunt until she begs to be released.”

The sensation within her shifts in focus and presses back into that bundle of nerves clutched up within her. She visibly shudders as she’s taken further down this course, working to steady her own frantic swallowed words,

“Kriff, I’m so close, I’m —” Her breaths are stilled again.

“The little Jedi won’t need to wait long to have me all alone to herself, less than 24 hours.” He thinks again for a moment. “I can’t stop thinking about her and how she wraps herself around me so nicely, how much she loves to watch me fuck her.”

Her lips fall open and the throb between her legs grows more desperate, her pulse speeding forward when she pictures the glossy sheen of her wetness on his cock as he brings his hips back. She edges closer before feeling the throb hitch away and she moans at losing the chain to her release.

“All alone looking for monsters in the woods and waiting for her favorite one to come see her, she’ll open her legs and ask me to fill up that hole in between, pleading to have me take her and mark her as mine. Her whole body burns right now just thinking about how much she wants it.”

Rey gets the impression that the narration is more for his own benefit than hers. She doesn’t understand how she’s been this _close_ on the edge for as long as she has, hovering just beyond the border of her own event horizon. She would have come by now if she were alone. A small whine creaks from her lips and she isn’t sure if it’s hers or being prompted out of her.

“She’s shaking for me, her sweet soft thighs wishing I was between them and stuffing her full right now.”

Rey shudders hard to move forward, thinking she’s about to cross over that crest when she’s jerked back again.

“She feels her little button swelling up under her fingers and thinks about swelling up under me and for me and her body asks so badly for what her head will not.”

Words tumble from her lips but they come from a place outside herself. “Please I need — Ben, please come inside me and make me yours —”

And she realizes she’s panting as she says it, her chest heaving up & down with her breaths as she thinks about it. She’s not sure she can bear the frustration of not finding her end again, rutting more so she doesn’t fall back like before. The form inside plugs her full and tempts her to sweep under its direction, prompting her hands to migrate to her tits and lay across just below her navel. Her release is halted, simultaneous with a brush across her mind. He’s _stopping_ her to keep dragging this along. It’s both maddening and overwhelming, not enough and too much at once.

“Soon, little Jedi. I’ll be all yours so soon.”

How long is he going to play the chords of her body, manipulate the terms of her arousal and delay her completion, sit here indulging in some personal fantasy as she keeps rubbing and pumping herself breathlessly — She feels the sheen of sweat over her forehead, the tension in her thighs crossing to exhaustion, and imagines a yearning frustration dancing over her features.

When he releases her to take a breath, Rey’s words are all her own. “Kriff — Ben, just let me come already.”

“You only had to ask.” She swears even his voice is smirking.

Her body bends, head tilted back against the wall, when she’s lifted just slightly and her mind goes blank. A black drop falls and ripples over the clean white screen, pooling over when she shuts her eyes and feels the heave of her chest rising with the restless movements of her shaking legs. He releases her throat but keeps her pinned, and there’s a heavy silence in the room holding up the traitorous sounds she makes when she comes. For a few brief moments she lets go of the final tether holding her back, lets the darkness devour her from within and consume her completely. She gasps when there’s a rush of wetness between her legs. She clamps her thighs together to hide the proof of her release as her breaths wind down, embarrassed by the mess leaked on the floor. There’s an air of curiosity that peeks over her thoughts before Rey shakes her head to cast it out.

“You’ve never done that before.” He sounds pleased with himself.

There’s no point in protesting it. Rey feels a small chill of nighttime air over her wet cunt, bends forward to find her clothing and musing over how she needs to clean this up. 

“And _you’ve_ always wanted to see if you could… do _that_ to someone haven’t you,” Rey presses with her tone sharp, emboldened by her desire to regain her position between them after allowing him to invade her body.

There’s no hesitation in his response. “Yes.”

“You have how many years of experience using the Force and have never tried….” She anticipates being interrupted here and is surprised to hear the sentence trail off.

“You should know already that passion is not the way of the Jedi,” he responds, not considering that this was an unlikely topic of conversation between her and Luke. “And that physical… temptations are a distraction from mastery of the Force.”

To Rey this sounds like an excuse for lack of opportunity, but she doesn’t say it aloud. She feels a small shiver run down when she brings her underwear up her legs and the fabric grazes over her worked & sensitive skin. 

“I’m going to have my revenge for that,” she states as her leggings go back on afterwards.

“I wouldn’t expect anything less.”

Rey leans back and looks directly to Kylo’s corner of the room, is fairly certain she meets his eyes. “I mean it.”

“I know. Show me tomorrow.”

She glances to the locked door and bites her lip. He said he would be there in less than 24 hours beforehand and Rey hadn’t taken it seriously, assuming that it was a part of the scene he had in mind. She curls the emphasis in her words with a certain amount of derision, “Certainly your _loyal subjects_ are expecting you on Balamak.”

There’s a small light breath from him, as if she’s said something funny. But it’s not quite a laugh. “Not for several days. Don’t mind the details.”

Rey clenches her jaw upon recognizing that he _was_ serious. Her chest tightens with a lingering gloom, her eyes cast to the ground when she feels the possibility of being directly responsible for the Resistance’s demise.

“So you can kill my friends. Wipe us out once and for all.”

Her hands grasp her knees to give them something to do. She let him too far in, let the darkness gather up & cast over like a heavy blanket and she forgot it cannot be trusted. Her stomach falls when she reminds herself _she let him,_ and it really didn’t even take much convincing if any at all — she didn’t even try to push him back even though she knows she could have....

“No.”

Rey looks up at that. She watches Kylo sit back up, hands moving forward to toggle switches along his invisible dashboard. His feet shuffle and shoulders settle when he reaches out to hold unseen controls. It reminds Rey of how strange their predicament really is.

He continues. “You’ve already decided to go into the forest. You hoped finding me and sleeping on it would change your mind, would make you forget about it. But you know you haven’t and you would have left after dawn whether I was coming or not.”

Rey swallows. How much did he see?

“The little Jedi doesn’t have to be alone. And she won’t be.”

“Kylo —”

But she is not given the opportunity to protest, and this time he’s the one to sever the connection between them. The air lifts and the corner is barren, Kylo’s dark figure absent from the room.

— — —

Rey looks over to Rose as she sleeps, the sun just starting to rise over the camp. The woman sleeps softly with a hand on her chest, and Rey steadies her movements as to not rouse her. She fills a backpack she found in storage with pilfered rations, two medikits, her cloak, a couple changes of clothes, a bedroll, along with the broken saber and Jedi texts. She rolls up a tent and straps it over the top. She adjusts the floorboard several times beneath her bed before feeling satisfied, hurling the pack over her shoulders and setting the blaster Poe gave her into a holster on her hip.

Rose sighs softly when Rey walks to the door. She considers whether she should leave a note telling Rose not to worry about her, but that might just increase her concern. Rey nods and says “stay safe” to the silent treehouse before exiting towards the single rooms.

She turns the opposite direction from Nell and Millham’s treehouse, where the window is now firmly closed. Rey shifts the weight of her pack on her shoulders as she continues towards Leia’s treehouse, undeterred by the early hour. Something tells her that the General will be awake. She drags her hand along the rope bridges, feels the steady hum of the forest’s energy even now before she sets in.

Rey hesitates a few moments before rapping her knuckles against the treehouse door, draws her mind into that blank white space as she hears Leia shuffling inside. The door peeks slightly before being opened completely and Rey can see a little bit of the General’s spartan quarters, eyes a table covered in maps.

Leia smiles. “Good morning, Rey.”

“Good morning. Leia, I… I’m requesting authorization to leave camp.”

It’s silent when Leia meets Rey’s eyes.

“Not off-world,” Rey clarifies. “To the forest. For a few days. There is still so much I don’t understand about the Force and I can’t find the peace I need to seek the answers here.” Rey reminds herself this is not a lie. “There’s something — There’s something there calling to me. I know you can feel it too.”

Leia’s expression remains soft as she nods slowly, sorting through what Rey tells her as she leans her hand on the entryway. She glances to the floor and Rey anticipates an attempted intrusion, but none comes. Rey expects to face some sort of protest or at least additional questions, but none of that comes either.

Leia looks back up to Rey. “Bring my son home.”

Rey’s heart drops to her knees. She decides not to pry into whatever it is Leia already knows, even though Rey’s next words craft an impossible promise she knows she can never keep. “I will.”

“May the Force be with you.”

The door closes quietly.

— — —

“Rey!”

She hears her name as she crosses the clearing, turns back to see Finn running towards her. She waits for him to catch up, moving her hands up onto the straps of her pack. His hands go to his knees when he stops beside her, as if he’d been rushing to her from a long distance.

“Where — Where are you going?”

Rey’s mouth opens to speak but initially no words come out. She chooses her reply carefully, not wanting to inspire his suspicion. “I’m camping alone a few days, to have some quiet to help me read the texts. There’s still so much I don’t know.”

Finn looks over to the woods, his features flickering with recent memory. “Look, I know you were gone a few days and —” He stops himself, as if not wanting to say too much. “I don’t know if you should go in there.”

She tries not to be irritated by the concern. “I’ll be fine.”

“There’s something in there, Rey,” he says with finality, as if he doesn’t want to be prodded to explain further. “Let me come with you.”

“No, this is… something I need to do alone.” She looks off into the Black Forest, starting to brighten beneath the rising suns. “I’m okay. Trust me.”

It’s funny to hear herself say those words when she knows she’s broken them already. Finn sighs and scratches his head, looking to the ground and back up to Rey. “Well, set off a flare or something if you need anything. Anything at all.”

“I will.” She steps forward to give him a brief hug, holds him close a moment and smells the stale fabric of his jacket, the sweetness of his skin. There is no pause between when Rey lets go and starts walking away, turning back to smile and wave at Finn one more time as she goes.

“Be careful,” he calls after her.

Rey nods but doesn’t turn back, listens to her feet as they take heavy steps forward. She feels the edges of the same darkness that she let Kylo drape over her, that same sensuous curiosity encouraging her to unlock her own power. She didn’t try to avoid it and she didn’t try to fight it — she ran right to it and let him possess her fully _through_ it. Its suggestive power is intriguing but dangerous, inviting but menacing.

And she wants it for herself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for every view, kudos, and comment. Having a lot of fun writing this story, and if you're enjoying it please share with your friends & followers :) Super excited to write these chapters in the forest and hope you will like it too.
> 
> Come say hi on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics)
> 
> Anticipate the next update going up on or around **Sunday, June 24th**.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beware: This chapter contains a very detailed explanation of how to skin & dress a rabbit that may make some people uncomfortable if not okay with eating meat. The animal in question is killed for sustenance and not for sport. There is another portion involving a slain animal that gets a little gory. Asterisks/signposts have NOT been included in-text to designate where these things begin & end due to the difficulty of isolating it in this manner. Any future warnings will be marked in-text as well as in note.

Rey hikes northwest towards the Ashmead’s Lock crash site, certain she will find her destination eventually if she heads that way. Not one of the Forest’s whispers have pointed her to this place in particular, but Chewie’s story from when they first arrived in Kashyyyk has loomed heavily on her mind ever since she felt something drawing her to the same general location. She does not have a map of the area and tracks the suns’ positions to stay on course, as she did while picking at the barren sandy expanses on Jakku. The ground is mostly dirt, with patches of moss in the areas where the surface dips & bends with the uneven terrain and exposed roots of the towering trees. She hears the trickle of a stream flowing to her right that cuts the Black Forest away from a set of steep mountains across the water, thankful to have a natural landmark to assist in charting her way back to camp. Rey chips a vertical line in a tree’s trunk every several yards to plot an additional map in case she is turned around. It’s disorienting not being able to see all the way out to the horizon like she did in the desert, and she is mindful to remain steady lest she become hopelessly lost in this unfamiliar territory.

At times the suns’ exact positions are obscured by the canopy and become diluted blotches of light filtering through the black-green leaves of the closely-grown copses of worshyrs. Thin grasses taller than Rey grow in clusters at the foot of the trees in these spots where the Forest is cast in a perpetual gloaming. They rustle along her arm wraps as she walks past them, as if pushing her forward. She wonders if the place earned its name from this trick of the light or from the color of the canopy, the darkness in these spots creating an inviting stillness in all the strangeness surrounding her. At times the soft skittering of the local fauna flitters between the trees, but their footsteps always shrink & fade away as if they’re running away from her. Despite all the fresh meat the Resistance enjoys at camp she has not yet encountered any other living creature.

As she walks out of a tightly-wound copse, Rey realizes that she’s gotten turned around, with neither tree in front or behind her sporting vertical marks in their trunks. Rey glances between the two and exhales through her nose, disappointed that she’s gone off-course so quickly. She prides herself on her intuitive ingenuity that kept her fed at Niima Outpost, but this… the challenge is a bit different is all. She set out knowing that she has no real plan aside from using the Force to help guide her way, figured relying on it in this manner would spur her to hone at least some basic capabilities very quickly.

Rey feels something flicker in the air around her. For the first time in a few hours it occurs to her that Kylo will soon be approaching Kashyyyk, if he hasn’t already. His impending presence is only a distant consideration in the back of her thoughts, having scoffed away any flutter it roused in her chest with the reminder that it’ll probably take him forever to find her. (No, she is not excited — she is nervous, she reminds herself.) He saw the treehouses at the main circle and the treeline from the relay tower when she granted him entry into her mind, and she can’t imagine he’d bring his ship to her tracker’s coordinates and risk being spotted by the Resistance. Assuming he was truthful when he said he is not coming to Kashyyyk to target them, Rey cannot square where he would land or how he plans to find her.

She sighs and shifts her feet to regain her bearings, pausing her thoughts to open herself up to whatever the Force may have to show her. Besides the handful of sessions with Luke and the times Rey has been able to maintain focus at camp — well, she really hasn’t had many opportunities to connect with the Force in a meditative state. Rey closes her eyes, keeping her arms down but turning her palms to face up to the shaded sky. 

Everything in the woods stills and lowers as an energy centers in the ground below her feet. It sways beneath her but her stance remains steady, the energy instead coming out as a nervous wriggle of her fingers on both hands. It presses up into the soles of her feet as a light pressure and she comes up on her toes briefly when the familiar humming she heard closer to camp pours into her ears. Rey lets it wash over and flow through her this time, it uncoils the unsettled reminder in her stomach of its accompanying voices. For several moments she feels rooted to the world below her feet, as if the Force forged this connection between limb & ground to guide her next steps. She does not flinch when she feels a brush run down her arm and over her hand towards the space in front of her.

She opens her eyes and nods her head, following where the touch directed her.

After only a few minutes of walking, Rey is able to locate her original trail and looks down to see a small leporine creature sitting by a patch of tall grass. It does not flee as Rey approaches, remaining motionless even when she stops just a couple of feet away. She chooses not to question the creature’s docile behavior and instinctively grabs for her staff behind her back. Rey presses her lips together into a straight line when she feels her pack, having briefly forgotten the staff is absent. She taps her fingertips along her blaster’s holster as the animal’s long furry ears twitch; she pictures the singed flesh the shot would leave as a border lining the hole of lost meat. Rey bites the inside of her cheek when her stomach grumbles, leaning down to the animal and coming to a pause.

No matter how close she gets it never runs, not even when her hands grab hold to snap its neck. The crack rings out through the trees in a soft echo and its body goes limp in Rey’s grasp.

Rey carries it upside down by its feet as she continues further along her path, its body swinging with the rhythm of her strides. She comes up to a clearing, smaller in size than where either ship is parked back at camp and tosses her kill to the ground alongside her backpack. She takes a few steps towards the center of the clearing and crouches to dig a small hole into the ground with her hands, the moist dirt easily moving aside. She tamps down the disturbed area with her hands to create a semi-smooth surface, satisfied with her makeshift firepit for now. She circles the perimeter of the clearing with her eyes to the ground, but most of the wood she sees is moist despite no recent rains.

Rey sighs and walks out towards the following stream, which is visible from the clearing. She washes her hands in the flowing water and splashes some over her face, closing her eyes to draw closer to the chill it brings down over her skin. She remembers taking pre-packaged bundles of kindling from the Outpost at times, the tied bunches of wood were shipped in to Jakku by various merchants. It’s strange to scavenge for these particular things herself, but she does manage to find some fallen branches that seem dry enough to break down. Rey drops the bundle beside the hole she dug before and sits down with her legs crossed to break down the wood into smaller pieces.

The cracks of their broken limbs echo through the trees like her lunch’s neck did before, but thump softly in the dirt as she drops them into a small pile in the pit. She grabs her pack to shuffle through the front pockets into the items that had been left by its prior user, taking out a sparkstone, paring knife, and small hatchet and laying them on the ground. Her hands stop when she feels the air go still, that familiar strain in her surroundings when there’s something reverberating in her bond with Kylo. She glances up to see a ruffle of black fabric between the trees before it's gone, shaking her head as she drags the knife down the stone to create small sparks that jump into the wood.

The fire starts up well enough, crackling softly as Rey steps away from her belongings with her meal to the edge of the clearing. She looks down at the paring knife, wondering if it will be sharp enough for what needs to be done and looking for an excuse to stall what will soon follow. But there's no point in dawdling when she’ll only get hungrier. 

Rey feels the air hang heavy again when she lays her meal’s body on an overgrown stump, brushing away some moss to make a flat surface. She pinches up a small pocket of skin on its back and brings the knife along the fur with her other hand, the blade slicing through the thin hide easily. Its skin feels delicate enough to break with a hard tug and Rey’s fingers explore further after she sets down the knife beside her. She hooks two fingers of each hand into the opening, settling the tips between the thin white tissue separating fur from skin. She bites her lip and firmly pulls her hands apart, one towards the head & the other towards the feet. There’s a soft zipping sort of sound as the hide separates into two pieces to reveal smooth skin beneath, tinged by red and purple maps of veins hiding sagging pockets of viscera. She bunches up more fur in her fists as she goes, dragging the creature open until she’s stopped at the extremities.

Rey is giving the two ends a final yank when she knows Kylo is here, feeling that same touch that drew down her hand before brushing a loose strand of hair to bid her to look up. She sees a dark silhouette approaching through the distant trees, too far away for the sound of his footsteps to reach her ears. There’s no heaviness drawing the air down around her nor the familiar beating silence of the bond, but in that moment there’s a flash of tightness in her chest when she’s reminded of when he found her and Finn in a forest — she sees the falling snow and red glow of Kylo’s saber as she threw him on his back and screamed. But here in the uneven casts of light Kylo looks strangely human, his large outline made more bulky by the pack on his back.

Rey snorts and turns her attention back to her meal. He brought a _backpack._ She’s not sure why it seems so silly.

Rey keeps her eyes down and continues, working a back leg out of its little sleeve of hanging skin. She counts her breaths and pretends she doesn't know that Kylo draws closer, yanking the limb out to tear off the hide. A patch of fur remains on its foot like a sock and Rey turns her attention to the second leg when she hears the thump of Kylo dropping his pack beside hers. She closes her eyes briefly before tugging the second foot out, the shorn hide making a satisfying slipping sound when it tears.

Rey sits back and looks up to Kylo when he kneels down in front of her on the other side of the stump, looking down at the partially-opened creature and Rey’s stilled hands laying on its front haunches. She is not surprised to see him wear all black, though his belt and tunic are missing as well as the cloak. His saber hangs from a holster. He wears the same inscrutable expression he did when the hatch of the escape pod lifted on the _Supremacy,_ lips set in a straight line with a small glimmer of curiosity in his gaze. It’s not until his gloved hands move that Rey realizes he’s holding her staff and he crouches forward to lay it down beside her silently. Her breath stops when she sees it flop down on the dirt, this familiar object tethered back to a part of herself that hasn’t been swept away by everything else changing so quickly.

She has it back. She… isn’t sure what to say. “Thank you” is the first thing to come out despite having no way to rationally explain to the Resistance how she got back her staff. Rey considers declining it for this reason alone, but it’s one that weighs heavily on her mind.

He nods in reply and points to the stump. “You need help?”

“I’ll be fine,” she replies, popping the front leg out of the skin. She brushes her fingertips over the little tuft of fur on the toes, it reminds her of a tiny child’s shoe. She makes quick work of the last leg and yanks at the half of fur bunched around its neck, tugging to get it to slip over the spine.

“Not my first time skinning one of those on Kashyyyk,” he says.

Rey doesn’t need him to elaborate on the circumstances to piece them together herself. She shakes her head as she remembers when Kylo claimed he did not hate the dead man who most likely taught him how to do it.

He continues, “If you’d like a break?’

She doesn’t need one, but takes it anyway. Rey stands up, holding the paring knife out to Kylo. “Fine.”

He takes it and she walks out to the stream, turning back when she reaches the edge to see Kylo hunching over her meal as he cuts into the neck. Rey crouches down to wash off her hands in the running water, taking these seconds to figure out what to do next. Rey came out to the Forest with the knowledge that Kylo would follow, still reeling from what she allowed him to do the evening prior. Her thoughts keep returning to when the stormtroopers fell to the floor at the mere suggestion of Kylo’s words, how he prompted the darkness around her to let him sink in, and the time she pushed back on him strapped in a chair armed with nothing but her anger and disgust. And how instead last night she granted him entry into every part of her, she even let him control her _hands_ and _words_ without much protest. It makes her consider that perhaps her mindset is changing quicker than she realized or perhaps it’s just a reminder of how much unrevealed potential the Force has to offer. She still can’t believe she allowed him to flip the control between them so readily.

For all her time spent pondering her own agency in the face of no longer being chained to Jakku, Rey has been unable to turn away these small flickers of temptation bidding her to compel another. After so many years of being bound by limitations, by portions, by _commands_ it would be kind of nice to prove to herself she is powerful enough to do this one thing — that she is strong enough not only to direct herself, but others also, to even bring them under the spell of her will. She is distantly aware of the darkness of these abilities, remembering Luke spitting in her ear with anger when she followed the calls of soft whispers on Ahch-To — Implying that she _not_ go _there_ or risk becoming like —

Rey looks up when she hears a crack by the stump, sees Kylo tearing the head off the creature with a curled twist of his arm after a final cut. He tosses it to the ground beside him, shaking some fluid off his hand before coming back to break the ankle of each limb beneath its furry boot. He looks oddly casual as he slices off each foot with the small blade, his long dark hair falling over his profile as he twists off each paw and sets them down with the head. One paw rolls down off the pile into the dirt and Rey wipes her hands on her trousers as she returns to kneel across from Kylo with the stump in between them.

“You cracked its neck cleanly. Made it easy to cut through,” Kylo says as Rey shifts her weight to get comfortable. He makes some final slices along the bottom of the tail and slides the hide out from underneath the naked meat, handing it to Rey. “If you’d like it.”

He points the edge of the knife to the hide in Rey’s hand and nods. It occurs to her he’s doing so because he likely assumes a scavenger would want that sort of thing. She scrunches her nose when she looks down the whitish pink underside and shrugs, laying it on a patch of mossy beside her staff.

“How did you find me?” She doesn’t see a point in polite introductions.

“Your Force signature is very strong.” He pinches a piece of the creature’s belly and makes a small incision in the thin membrane, slipping two fingers into the hole and curling them up as he slides the knife down to its pelvis. “I could feel your presence the moment I got off my ship.”

“Where did you land?” Rey stares down into the dark red lumps of exposed organs as Kylo pries the creature open. He brings the knife up the other way to its ribcage until it’s opened up through the neck.

“Few miles west. Away from prying eyes in relay towers.”

He smirks at that and Rey wonders if it’s an attempt at being lighthearted. She pictures local clusters of wookiees raising their eyebrows at a low-approaching TIE-type ship and imagines their concerned whispers winding their way back to camp. 

“You came prepared.” Rey nods to their packs beside the small fire.

“My personal ship is always prepared,” he responds as if it should be obvious. He places the knife on the stump to use two hands to stretch open the chest and Rey takes the blade to slice the dark pink membrane by its lungs & heart to detach the cavity from the creature’s intestines. Somehow she knew to do so without his needing to ask for a second set of hands.

“Did you have a nice _flight?_ ” Rey asks with an eyebrow raised.

“Found ways to make the time pass quickly.”

Kylo pokes one finger in the open flap of neck and his other hand comes down to hook two fingers into the chest cavity. There’s a soft squelch when he presses down into the animal’s spine and brings his hand down in a strong steady motion to unravel its organs from their binds. They squeeze in together and reveal the lined cages of bone and spine beneath. He drags twice against the end and Rey cuts through the pelvic bone to clear the space for removal. Rey plucks out the heart, liver, and kidneys to set them on the stump while Kylo flops the remaining viscera to the ground. They flump wetly on the dirt and he swats some blood from his hand.

Both of them come to stand and Rey takes the cleaned body with them to the stream to rinse the last flecks of blood and hair from the meat in the water. The trees silently loom over them to hide them beneath the canopy, closing them off from the distant echoes of whoever else might need them. She sees Kylo bend down to wash his hands in her periphery and briefly asks herself if this is what it’s like to be lost on a distant planet with Ben Solo.

He takes a long thin branch from the ground and takes the meat from Rey to skewer the carcass through it head to tip. Rey takes some additional stakes of fallen wood with them as they walk silently to the fire. Kylo tends to the flames with the tip of the occupied stick while Rey burrows the stakes in vertically, chopping tiny v’s into their heads with her hatchet. He rests the stick in the grooves and the two sit down to watch the flames lick the creature’s meat, letting the silence unfold between them. It doesn’t seem awkward to feel the quiet with him like this and Rey doesn’t feel compelled to fill the empty space.

But it doesn’t strike unnaturally when Kylo breaks the stillness. “What are you looking for here?”

Rey covers her teeth with her lips, unsure whether to play all her cards quite yet. But doesn’t see any real reason not to. “I’m hoping to find what I was looking for with Luke.” She pauses. “To find my place in all this.”

She turns to face Kylo and his quizzical face. She brings up a single finger to signal him to hold on, walking over to her pack to remove one of her books. She sits back down beside him and sighs with the unintelligible Jedi text in her lap, spreads her fingers over its leather cover and continues,

“I’m so close to reading these and being able to get more answers. Like they’re right there waiting for me. But I can’t understand the words.”

Kylo brushes his hand over Rey’s and draws it back. “You’re just not reading it correctly. You don’t know how.”

Rey hesitates before narrowing her brows and turning to face him. “I know how to _read._ ”

“That’s not what I mean.” He leans in to take the book and lays the tome upside down on his legs, opening the back cover to expose the final page. “It’s a… cipher.”

Rey comes in closer to see him pointing to a swirling grid, its spirals bisected by proportionally growing lines. She lets out an exasperated sigh as she looks down to the image. “It’s a striped blob.”

“A striped blob you need to meditate upon before you can access the rest.” Rey leans in closer to Kylo’s lap to squint at it as he continues speaking, “It’s your code for reading it.”

Rey sits up and takes the book from Kylo, poring over the picture laying open on her knees and breathing deeply to wait for its lines to react with some signal of recognition. She hears Kylo shuffle beside her to turn the skewer over to cook the creature’s side and unfocuses her gaze to render the grid into a doubled image. Its negative quivers lightly and Rey breathes deeply in time with the vibrations, hears Kylo’s movements fade into silence beneath the white noise that crackles in her ears. The grids overlap until they reunite in bold relief, the crossing hatches pulse with a purplish haze. Rey bites her lip and flips the book over to open the front cover, parts the tome open to a random page and sees the previously-unreadable text sheen with shades of red & blue. The words are dense and not immediately digestible but they’re _there._

Her mouth falls open when she flips to more pages and they’re all… accessible as well. She can barely believe how _simple_ this was all along. There’s a bursting flash of resentment that runs through her when she thinks that this would have been so easy for Luke to mention to her, even though she never asked.

Kylo’s voice rouses her awake from this reverie. “Did it work?”

She shuts the book closed and straightens her posture. “Yes.”

“But that’s not what you came for, is it.”

Rey forces herself to look directly into Kylo’s eyes when she considers her response, remembering when he spoke of her running into the forest to find what’s calling her there. He says his words to her as a statement because he’s already seen her motivations, already knows what it is that draws her here.

“No.” She glances down to his lips and back into his eyes. “But you already knew that.”

“You’re looking for whatever whispers to you in your little treehouse at night.”

Rey smirks. “I guess so. And I have no idea where it is.”

“We’ll find it.” Rey notices no skip in his beat or any hesitance in referring to it as a joint venture. He turns back to their meal and turns the skewer again. “Better to do it on a full stomach.”

— — —

The meat is surprisingly tender for a wild kill, and they pick the creature’s spine clean easily. They split the organs evenly and agree the kidneys are a bit gritty, that they should have cooked the heart more and the liver less. He opens his pack to show Rey some of the items brought along, including his own tent & bedroll strapped along the back. She isn’t surprised to see his tunic, belt, and cloak stuffed inside. He brought along more rations packs, another medikit, a machete, and some strips of white cloth. He insists on not unpacking the whole thing before they set up camp for the night and Rey huffs in agreement as they start trekking to the northwest towards the soon-setting suns.

She doesn’t anticipate finding his company tolerable, but they carry through moments of conversation easily when they arise during their hike. Rey moves slightly ahead, using her staff as a walking stick as she glances back to Kylo to ask him things like how old he was when he first went hunting or if he has a favorite planet and season. He asks how she learned to fly a ship and what is the most valuable thing she found on Jakku. He shakes his head when she answers BB8 and says that’s not what he means. It’s so strangely casual to hike through the woods with him that she almost forgets she’s wandering around camping with Kylo kriffing Ren who’s supposed to be murdering her right now (or trying to be) only how many miles from what’s left of the entire Resistance. It’s funny in that it doesn’t really bother her at all, that she feels comfortable just being with him like this.

Rey hears snapping sounds up ahead, raising her hand to signal a stop. She stands still, turns to Kylo who nods and stares back forward. She creeps up to peek around the thick trunk of a particularly large worshyr before them, one foot remaining behind it as she slips to see just beyond….

— Namit and Cicer stand over the carcass of one of the cervine animals they frequently bring back to camp. She’s so startled by their appearance that Rey does not think to question why they are so far from the treehouses or how they plan to make it back before dark. Its pelt is already removed and laying on a nearby rock. Namit crouches down to cut off one of the remaining hooves —

Rey gasps wordlessly and flings her back to the tree with widened eyes. She gestures Kylo to join her with a finger to her lips. He raises his eyebrows and shifts his grip on his pack, trudging closer quietly and leaning back beside her on the tree. He exhales through his nose and bends over to look for himself, stalls when Rey lays a hand on his chest.

“They — they can’t see us,” she breathes. “Do you think they heard —”

Kylo shakes his head. Rey has no desire to explain further and is relieved he doesn’t ask her to elaborate. She closes her eyes briefly, wonders how long they should wait until the pair leave or maybe do something else instead, and she feels Kylo take her hand to move it away. Her eyes flutter open to see him leaning back over her and she sighs as she turns to follow, just peering out beyond the edge of their hiding place.

Cicer sits besides Namit on the ground, the two men bending forward into the exposed entrails of their kill. Their red smeared hands hold the creature’s liver between them and Rey scrunches her nose as she watches Cicer slice it in half and hand it to his companion. The two eat their portions raw, the organ’s fluids creating a viscous smear over their lips. Namit finishes his part quickly, pushing a hand back into the creature to rip its heart out gracelessly. A flourish of blood splatters over his shirt when he does and Cicer pauses in his movements to watch Namit lean in and take a bite. Rivulets of blood trickle from the corners of his lips down his chin and its spread all over his mouth and the bottom of his nose when he sits back to present it. Cicer takes the heart from Namit and more blood pools from it as his teeth sink into the flesh, dribbling on his clothes and on the ground.

“Is that the normal way to prepare it?”

Kylo’s voice rouses Rey away from the unease lingering in her stomach when she watches the scene before her. She realizes from Kylo’s tone that he’s… he’s making a joke. It’s probably the only time she hasn’t heard him be gloomingly serious, and of course it’s this moment he chooses to do it.

“No,” she answers, clenching her jaw together.

“This is the _company_ you keep with the Resistance?”

“They… I don’t think this is normal for them.”

Rey declines to mention that she doesn’t actually know, having frequently seen the men slip into the woods and return with already-dressed meat. She really doesn’t know what they do alone with one another. Not that they’ve ever deemed her worth speaking to anyway, given her friendship with Poe. But there’s something uncanny in the men’s upturned lips that makes her insides lurch, sends her a signal that something here isn’t quite right. The pair continue to consume the heart by alternating bites and before long there’s even blood flicked up on their foreheads. Is that what is even supposed to happen when you eat an animal’s heart raw? Is any of this normal?

Rey takes a deep breath to try and dismiss the humming in her ribs, the same ringing bell she felt back at camp. Her exhalation catches in her throat and she blinks twice, stilled by the noise running through her. She continues staring at the pair without caring whether they might see her, is distantly aware that she sees Kylo move his hand in her periphery. There’s a loud bump and crash that echoes through the trees behind Namit & Cicer, the two of them pausing to look back to the source. They stare at the other for a second before nesting the mostly-devoured heart back in with the remaining untouched viscera, coming to stand and slip away into the woods behind them to investigate further.

Rey meets Kylo’s eyes as he nods to her and they pass through to continue on their way. Neither of them say anything else about it for the remainder of their trek.

— — —

They stop at a clearing when the third sun slips down beneath the horizon. Rey finds a spoon in the front of Kylo’s pack and uses it to dig out a spot for a fire, kneeling down on the dirt to tamp it down and drop down dry bits of twigs and branches. She hears Kylo surveying the perimeter and cracking down low-hanging branches from commingling flora, soon bringing back a bundle that he drops on the ground. He takes Rey’s hatchet and bends down to start hacking them into smaller logs. Rey watches the twitch of his arm beneath the fabric of his long sleeves as the axe blade comes down to split the wood. He stops, moves a piece of hair out of his face and looks up to Rey with a smirk. She glances away and feels a flush over the top of her cheeks when he asks her to find a few more pieces. 

The forest dims as the suns settle away, a darkness slowly sweeping over the dirt floor. It’s peaceful snapping these dead bits of wood from their rooted spots, listening to the steady thwack the hatchet makes as Kylo turns it into kindling, and it’s so curiously detached from all she knows as if the two of them being here isn’t even real. She muses on that in particular as she returns to drop the pile by Kylo’s feet, sitting down before the logs already placed in the pit with the sparkstone. She drags her small blade down over the stippled edge and watches the bits of ignitor cling to the fibers of wood to bubble up bits of flame. The fire catches and grows, spreading out over the logs to lick them up completely. Rey comes to stand as Kylo finishes chopping through the last bundle she brought; she peeks into her bag to take out a single rations tin.

She stands beside him and holds it out like an offering. “Still full from earlier, but maybe we should share one of these.”

He moves his lips as if chewing on something Rey can’t see. “Should set up shelter first.”

Rey bites the inside her cheek, made a little bashful by how driven she is by sustenance over common sense at times. She wonders if this particularly old habit, formed by so many long years of experience, is one she will ever be able to break away from. Rey nods and sets the tin by the fire, smoothing down the fabric of her shirt as she watches Kylo detach the tent from his pack. It unfurls over the ground and Rey notes it’s larger than the one she brought, realizes it’s probably the proper thing to do to set up her own separate tent. She moves to her pack and takes out her bedroll, begins unclipping her own tent when she hears Kylo speak beside her,

“Sleep with me tonight.”

Her hands stop and she brings them down to rest on her thighs, considering his words carefully. She presses her lips together and looks over to see Kylo holding out four stakes that unrolled from his tent. She glances to the stakes in his open palm and back up to his eyes, plucking them out and letting them roll between her fingers.

She doesn’t need to ask why he wants her to. It’s the same reason she nods and says, “Okay.”

Rey walks past him to burrow the stakes by the corners of the flayed out fabric, stomping down on the heads with the heel of her boot to root them in place. She goes inside to loop together bits of flexible wire as Kylo winds the outside ties into their places, his long large fingers making surprisingly small & precise knots. He tugs on the corners and Rey sees the fabric shell shift around her, smiles and calls out he’s pulling too hard. She crawls out of the tent on her hands & knees as Kylo crosses in front of the entrance to tie the final stake, slapping her ass as she comes to stand.

“Hey...” she murmurs with an exaggerated pout, not remarking on his thin mischievous grin.

She goes behind him as she walks back to the fire, returning the favor with a quick crack of her hand. She smiles to herself when she senses him glancing back to her as she sits, peeling back the metal seal of the rations tin and waiting for him to join her. She sticks the top in the middle to cut the oval of protein pate in half, grubbing her portion out with her fingers as Kylo comes to sit beside her. His eyes flicker down to watch her eat with her fingers, twirling a small utensil in his hand. Rey stops a moment later when she realizes Kylo is offering it to her, but she shakes her head and continues on.

She licks a few last flecks of food from her lips as she hands the half-filled tin to Kylo. He removes the metal top still wedged in the middle, looking down into the can as he picks out pieces with his fork. Neither one of them speak as Rey watches him eat, although he glances up occasionally to meet Rey’s gaze. She’s not unsettled by his awareness that she’s watching or by her intrigued curiosity, regarding whatever it is that makes her just sit there and observe him be so boringly mortal — eating from a rations tin instead of gaining sustenance by some other nefarious means like a proper monster should.

Rey breaks the silence between them this time. “Why are you here, Kylo?”

“Because I can be” is the only response he offers, setting the emptied tin down beside his feet. He looks to the ground briefly as if hoping this will be sufficient.

“That’s not it,” she mutters, remembering how he said those words to her before.

He does not shrink away from her implicit challenge and nods, takes a minute before answering with a steady tone. “So we can be alone.”

Rey watches her hands curl over each other, unsure what to do with them or whether Kylo’s answer requires a further response. She decides to be plain. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“What it sounds like.” Rey rolls her eyes at this and he adds, “Why does it matter?”

Rey glares at Kylo, waving her hand to the south to gesture towards the Resistance camp. She knows her face flashes with the same frustration that comes through her tone of voice. “You haven’t given a single thought to what could happen if someone finds out that —”

“Snoke? Of course I’ve thought about that,” he scoffs.

She shakes her head, preferring to skirt around what she actually wants to say but he’s being more dense than she anticipated. Rey breathes out through her nose. She decides not to push further and files this interaction away for later review.

They sit and watch the fire, Rey glancing over to see Kylo’s features framed in the flames’ orange glow. Occasionally he pokes the burning pile with one of the unused logs, the wood rolls over and settles with a fluttering plume of embers sparking to the sky. It feels late quickly beneath the Forest’s canopy despite the nighttime hour not creeping in too long ago, the foliage making the early darkness thicker than it should be. Their conversation unravels in low whispers despite seeming so alone, Rey leaning her cheek on her knee bent to her chest. She tells him how she taught herself to read through sheer determination. He surprises her by telling her he did calligraphy of all obscure & useless things, but fell out of practice a few years ago. She asks how old he was when he stopped cutting his hair short. He asks what made her start wrapping her arms, takes a bit of the fabric to unravel it when he does. She sits there with her arm out straight, letting him continue as she answers and finding her smile brighter than she expects when he reaches for her other arm. He tugs her closer and she scooches in, slightly leaning in as he unwraps the covered limb.

He drops the wraps behind them and runs his hands over her exposed skin, the leather of his gloves feels smooth as it stutters over her elbow and flicks away at her wrist. She hears the chirp of a nocturnal creature in the distance but she doesn’t turn towards it, looking down at Kylo’s hands as he takes off his gloves and grazes his bare fingers down her other arm. 

He leans back and returns his eyes to the fire. Rey blinks a moment, kneeling up to toss another log onto the blaze before they fall back into silence. Rey hopes staring into the flames will inspire a vision that tells her where to go, what to do — whether it’s right to want to stay on her course instead of running back to camp and telling them they need to flee. But this doesn’t happen. She glances over to Kylo and wonders if he’s thinking about the same thing, hoping to find some sort of answer to pluck from the fire. She knows there’s something he isn’t telling her, his face betraying too much without a mask.

Rey tunes her ears to the crackling flames, the sputters of decaying kindling whirring a heaviness into the stillness that already surrounds them. It lays over them like an unseen fog, closing off the Forest’s sounds until she can only hear their breaths. She closes her eyes as she feels their bond unfold between them, is aware he moves to resettle his weight beside her as she presses forward to unfurl the connection completely. She shudders when he glances his fingers down her neck and she feels how it’s smooth beneath his touch. She opens her eyes to look at him, finding that he already faces her with an open palm. She tests the stability of the bond by tickling her index finger over it, recognizes the mirror sensation flutter over her own hand. He blinks twice when Rey comes closer to touch his cheek, looking straight into him to see if she can say what she’s been drawn back to so many times that day — but without the shame of having to say the words aloud:

_Show me how to do it._

Kylo’s eyes flicker with recognition and his lips part as if to speak before he suddenly presses them shut. He nods and Rey feels the low tide of his voice in her chest when his answer enters her mind,

_To do what?_

Rey raises an eyebrow and crosses her arms, having anticipated his being able to read her intentions more freely through their connection. Perhaps delving into these locked segments of sentient beings requires a larger push from the Force. But there’s something that seems to hold between them still, reminding Rey of the membrane she sliced earlier — that which separated her meal’s chest cavity from its entrails. Rey feels herself press down on it as she responds,

_Show me how to influence someone’s mind. Show me how to… how to find what it is you’re looking for._ There’s a pause. _How to stop them cold._

Kylo turns back to the fire and stays quiet. She senses a hesitance cropping up from him, his thoughts churning over how to respond. He offered once to teach her before she ran and now he balks that she’s here requesting some guidance. Rey quells a tiny roll of frustration that runs through her, which seems to prompt Kylo to respond,

_You want me to bring you closer to the Dark Side of the Force._

Rey bites her lip, unsure how to decipher his words. She feels the same creeping temptation run down her arms like the leather from his gloves, hears the resentment in Luke’s tone when he lectures her aghast for running to the whispers that spilled into her ears on Ahch-To. There’s the same plucking finality in her gut that kept her rooted as she snapped before the cave’s mirrors. Despite the unsettling loss of agency that looms over her intrigue Rey finds herself nodding in assent, motivated by seeking the limits to her will without the trappings of servitude.

_I guess so._

He answers immediately. _You already know how._

_I’m… I don’t know if I’m doing it right._ Her face is open when she looks down the line of his cheek, runs her gaze down his jaw. _It was just that once. With the trooper._

Rey comes in close to breathe out into his ear, pushes hard into the barrier between them until she feels her stomach lurch and fall forward. Her forehead comes down on his shoulder and there’s a small crack like a thin rubber band when her chest topples through. Her eyes close and she sees their camp from a new angle, spots the brown lines of her hair as her head rests forward on an unseen shoulder, watches the fire sputter behind a figure that wears her clothes —

Rey sits up with a gasp and the moment is broken, suddenly thrown from Kylo’s eyes as all the air leaves her chest with a sharp exhale. He’s staring straight into her when she leans back and sees him shift his hands, working to steady his breaths as the bond shuts down.

“You already know how,” he says aloud.

— — — 

They retire not too long afterwards, Kylo standing up to say they should try to sleep before walking out to relieve himself somewhere in the woods. Rey rummages through her pack for the sleepware she brought, thumbing through until she feels the familiar threadbare fabric between her fingers. She changes in the tent and throws aside the hooded cloak Kylo tossed in earlier, going back to her bag to return her worn clothes and grab some items. She undoes her bedroll to spread it wider in the tent, takes Kylo’s in from outside and does the same to arrange them in such a way to sleep beside the other.

_What are you doing, Rey_

She ignores her conscience’s whispers although she knows she shouldn't, turning to look over her shoulder when she hears Kylo outside the tent. He crawls through the entrance and comes up beside her, pulling off his shirt before laying on his back with his hands behind his head. Rey watches his chest move as he breathes, listens to the hushed stillness of the forest around them in their darkened cavern. The moons’ light barely filters through the canopy to the ground below, much less through the tent’s fabric, but there’s just enough illumination for Rey’s eyes to adjust and see it all in blackened shades of grey. She lays down next to him to look up to the artificial ceiling, feels her chest catch a second when he rustles beside her. He runs his fingers down her arm again and Rey takes it as a signal, moving herself in to lay her head on his chest and bring her body close to his. He’s warmer than she expected given the lack of clothing, and she rests her eyes when he brings his arm around her. She listens to his heartbeat beneath his skin and realizes how peaceful everything is at this moment, being removed from all the obvious complications that usually follow.

_What would Finn say right now?_

Her eyes flutter open, the intrusive consideration coming through without warning. She sees the concern in Finn’s eyes as he looked to the forest and insisted she not leave, but still has not felt whatever it is that pushes him away. She imagines him shaking his head and kicking a pebble in the dirt, not being able to look into her eyes when her stories inevitably become more murky and her secret unravels as he places the pieces together…

…But somehow she’d make Finn understand it’s not all that bad. Even _an asset,_ as the Resistance is so fond of saying, although she is still unable to square who it is that holds the keys between her  & Kylo. The day was so easy after all her fears back at camp and she doesn’t understand why it all seems so _natural_ and unweighted despite her relinquishing herself entirely the night before. Kylo clutches her close and it’s the first time in years she’s shared a place to sleep. She’s surprised it’s not uncomfortable. She hears a couple branches crack in the distance, but nothing close to their camp. Out here they’re entirely alone.

“It’s quiet.”

Rey stirs and looks up at Kylo when she responds, noticing that he seems to stare at something very far away. “It’s nice.”

A breeze withers through the leaves and the tent’s fabric, sending a chill through Rey. She sits up and crawls to grab a pair of blankets, turning away from Kylo to dig into the borders of the tent to find them. She feels him come up behind her, his large hands resting on her arms when he presses against her back.

Rey straightens up and his hands come down over her breasts, his mouth close to her ear when he breathes out, “You don’t need those.”

She’s careful not to chuckle at his feeble attempt to change the tone between them, resting her head back on him as he runs under her shirt. She does not wear her band to sleep and his hands creep up to cover her small tits, one moves down to thumb over her nipple. He lingers briefly, bringing his lips close to her neck as the hand descends to rub over the fabric between her legs.

Rey considers how silly it is that she’s always so easily swept into his touch, this time crediting the stillness of the Forest itself for creating this sensation of being hidden from the entire galaxy here. She grinds her ass against his lap when his hand comes up to dip in behind the border of her pants. Her mouth falls open as his fingers graze over the tufts of hair in her underwear to pry two fingers into her cunt. He drags out slowly before shoving his fingers up inside her again, and a blush dances over her cheeks when she’s already wetter than she realized — She’s unsure if it’s their bond or mere biology that underpins her desires, but her body doesn’t ever seem to mind his touch.

“Why do you like that?” she asks when he keeps fingering her, bringing his face down to nip the skin below her ear. She rolls her hips against his knuckles, huffs when he bites her harder through the fabric covering her shoulder and sticks a third digit in.

It takes him a few more moments to answer, as if he needs to remember how to speak first, “Does it matter?”

Rey supposes it doesn’t matter really and lets herself bounce when he thrusts up beneath her in time with his fingers, her body held in a tight grip by his other arm circling her chest. Their soft breaths flutter through the tent and right then there’s nothing else that matters outside this space they’ve crafted alone, set apart, and without anyone reminding her about the metaphorical blood on the hands she lets probe inside her.

She sighs and reaches up for his hair, ends up poking the bridge of his nose instead. He doesn’t mention anything and withdraws his fingers, sliding her slickness up through her hair and below her navel when he draws his hand up. She comes down off his lap and doesn’t turn to face him when his hands curl the bottom of her shirt. She straightens her arms up as he shuffles it off her, the cool nighttime air prompting goosebumps to raise over her flesh. She glances over her shoulder to see he’s already getting out of his pants, and isn’t sure why she finds the presumptive hurriedness amusing.

Rey doesn’t realize she laughed aloud until Kylo stops and stares into her. His eyes betray just enough vulnerability for Rey to recognize the awkward timing — she looks down to his hard cock and realizes he thinks she’s laughing at his nudity. Her initial response is to clarify the misunderstanding, explain it’s his eagerness and not _him_ per se that elicited the small sound from her throat. She stops herself from speaking and holds a breath when she feels this small accident shift something between them, despite this not being the first time she’s seen him this way. His shoulders come down just slightly but he doesn’t address it aloud. He turns his gaze towards the closed tent entrance and Rey finds herself mapping a new route, sees a crack opening in a distant window, notices a path to attaining what she promised to Kylo the night before.

Rey does not know why the prospect prompts a small bud of excitement in her chest, but chooses not to question it. She isn’t sure she recognizes the thin smile she feels parting over her lips when she says, “Tell me how much you want to fuck me.”

There are several seconds of hesitation as he looks straight into her eyes, something flickering over his gaze as he formulates a reaction. He starts touching himself and Rey openly stares, watching the way he rubs his large hand over his cock. Rey sees his mouth open and his dark hair falls over his face in her periphery, but she doesn’t look away as she feels the same flutter of invasive curiosity she felt the night before gazing through Nell and Millham’s open window. She hears his breath shudder but he doesn’t speak. She repeats herself firmly, narrowing her features into a glare as she crawls towards him,

“Say it.”

She stays on her hands & knees as she comes in closer, flicking her tongue over her lips when she stops a few inches from his dick. He slows his pace, tugging down with a guarded intrigue in his eyes as he waits expectantly for her to push forward. His hand comes down again and she leans in to lick the bead leaking from the tip, sees his body tense from the small movement. She sits back and he tugs faster again when he speaks,

“I want to see your mouth stretched around me when I feel the back of your throat. See you look up at me on your knees when you try not to gag.”

She raises an eyebrow and dances her fingers over her breasts, sweeping down over her stomach when he reaches out for her. She swats his hand away and goes beneath her pants to feel herself inside, exaggerates her moan when her mouth falls open.

He starts up again. “I want to watch your legs shake when I —”

She springs forward to shove her slick digits in his mouth and tells him to,

“Stop talking.”

His tongue rolls over to taste her and his teeth close in lightly around her knuckles, taking his hand off his cock to grasp towards Rey again. She sweeps it away and removes her fingers, kneeling back to shuffle out of her pants when he comes down on his hands to move closer, crawling over to grasp her shoulders and signal her to move down. She stops with her remaining clothing bunched about her knees, pulls his hair to bring his face close to hers and looks straight into his eyes when she lifts the energy between them to push forward just as she did earlier —

He sits up suddenly and she keeps her grip on his hair, letting her body jerk up with his when he retreats from her attempted intrusion. She kisses his neck and smiles against his skin when she murmurs,

“I don’t want you to say anything at all.”

Her hand leaves his hair to rub over his cock and she hears a shift in his breath, resting her forehead on his shoulder as he tries to yank her clothes below her knees. Their position prevents it and Rey hears herself laugh again, she hears herself speak but isn’t sure where she found the words,

“Aren’t _you_ eager to get your dirty hands all over me?” she asks, somehow sensing the implication will be enough. She feels his grasp hesitate and she moves back away from him. “Who said you decide when to touch me?”

Rey removes her last bits of clothing, lays them beside her with a shiver when the cool air flares an awareness between her legs. She comes up on his lap and takes him in her hand again, grinding her wetness on his bare thigh as she does. She presses up against the same mental resistance she felt at the fire, this time probing just slightly deeper below the surface before he pushes her out.

The tug & distance between their minds run opposite their bodies, which only seem to want to be brought closer together. She resists the urge to sink down on Kylo and tries to delve through him again, this time feeling a rippled edge of openness when she pries in. Rey pushes further, straddles over him and lines him up with her entrance as if to grant him access to the narrow hallway within. She lowers to unfurl herself around him just slightly, soaking the tip before she hitches back up. She presses down on his shoulders for leverage when she does it again, only giving him this small taste of what he wants. She digs her nails into his skin when he grabs her hips to push her down, turns her head when he leans in to meet her lips.

“Don’t kiss me,” she breathes, closing her eyes as she gathers the energy between them. His grip loosens as she lowers herself onto him, just enough to make him think she’s abided before kneeling up again.

“Rey —”

He licks against the palm of her hand when she covers his mouth to silence him, can tell he’s getting frustrated even though she hasn’t really delayed him long at all. She’s not surprised he has little tolerance with the roles reversed. A flutter of anticipation runs through her when she sees how close she’s drawn him to her predetermined destination, realizes she’s put him off-balance just enough to maintain her course. She clutches his shoulders when she teases him again, he groans when she does it once more,

“Rey, please —”

She shoves hard against the shaken barrier between them, loses her breath when all the air leaves the tent. She feels how her hands grasp his shoulders, the reflection of her thighs grazing against his shivers down her skin. Kylo’s eyes widen as he’s silenced, his pawing hands paused against her tits. She hears her breathing harden, her body tightening with the rush of her success. She comes off his lap but he does not move, his hands frozen in their prior position.

She hesitates a moment before testing further. “Lay down.”

He obeys wordlessly, scooting to the bedrolls to rest on his back. She chuckles at the sight, at the way his hard cock stands perpendicular to his horizontal body. He watches her crawl over but remains unmoving, keeps his hands to his sides as she sits on his stomach. Rey brushes aside the static of their bond and confirms he’s yielded himself to her like she did for him prior, her words prompting his actions rather than his assent.

But he does speak to her another way. _Please._

“I _said_ stop talking.”

Rey leans down to nip his ear, feels her pussy soaking over his stomach with the thrill of having him beneath her. Her body feels strong as she slinks back on him, she notices his pulse speed up when she clutches his bicep and bites his chest. She directs his hands to her hips as artificial guides and he lifts his head to watch as he enters her. She closes her eyes and shudders when he’s fully seated within, sees how her thighs flex and breasts bob as she bounces on top of him. She’s surprised to be more aroused than alarmed by the perspective change, wonders if Kylo did this in the dark storage room.

She opens her eyes to regain her bearings, pressing her hands on him when she adjusts her knees to shift where he ends inside her. Her stubby nails dig against his skin, his hands obeying politely when she cues them to pull her hair. She clenches around him to feel the echoed sensation run between her legs, moans when he bucks up under her to press against her spot and spur the reverberation through himself.

Her tone is harsher than intended when she speaks. “Make yourself useful and rub my clit.”

Something flickers through their bond when he fulfills her order, dragging the pad of his thumb in slick circles that expose the small swelling nub from its hood. She ruts on him faster to fill herself harder, vocalizing louder as she bids him to touch her as needed, and she notices a familiar pump within her that reminds her of when he asked her to slow down — His mouth falls open when he lets her darkness in and Rey tamps down the tide rising in him, his face straining when she tells him,

“You will _not_ ruin this for me, Ben.”

He will _not_ ruin this validation of her agency, this reminder that her body is now hers alone and that with that ownership she can even compel the bodies of others under her will. She leans her head back and closes her eyes to watch herself as she rides him and creeps closer to her release, sees the flush she feels on her face and the sweat that trails down her ribcage when she claims him. She’s more exhilarated by the control than she had even imagined, gasps loudly when she changes the ministrations of his thumb, and feels utterly filled by both him and herself —

_— and the power she feels run through her, the control she exerts over the world around her, and her own will & passion brought together in a tantalizing proposal of possibility & potential —_

She reels back when Kylo takes back control briefly, his features contorting as he lets out an awkward laugh. His fingers dig into her hips when he skips a breath and grunts, shoves her down hard on him when he laughs again,

“I should have expected this — Of course the little scavenger would get off on the idea of fucking someone into submission after being told what to do for so long, her tiny hands just want to grab that power so badly, even if it’s just to use me to get herself stuffed —”

The whole world stops when she brings back her hand and slaps him across the face. She hates it when he calls her that.

_“I said stop talking.”_

He looks up at her with a small pink print spreading on his cheek, his expression worn with a lustful curiosity she did not expect. “Do it again.”

She narrows her eyes and slows her hips, not anticipating this response. “Excuse me?”

_“Do it again.”_

She hesitates briefly before raising back and hitting him across the other cheek, sees a small grin peek over his lips before she regains her control of him and feels him relent through their bond. Her chest heaves as she resumes her pace, his hand returning to its prior activities. Her breath hitches as she feels herself reeling closer, and she leans forward to press the side of his face into the ground,

“You _like_ that,” she sneers. “You _want_ me to hit you, you sick moof milker.”

She pushes harder against his cheek and feels the slight sting of the awkward angle, surprised to feel him building inside her and he makes a startled sound when she grazes his mind to reel him back. She clutches her hand around his throat and closes in, his eyes shutting as she feels a muted haze come down over her senses. He _can_ feel it through their connection after all —

“You like that too?” she asks, utterly swept up in whatever has unfolded between them. “You like it when I fuck you like this?”

She releases his face only to slap him again, having no idea what it is that has come over her but knowing it’s something she enjoys. She asks herself whether she should feel guilty and decides she shouldn’t, determining that of all people he could use the backhanded reminder of… whatever it is he’s looking to have dispelled. She has some ideas but is too close to coming to care.

She repositions herself again to gain more traction, feels herself building to her end and tightens up around him to let him know. She closes her eyes and sees herself rutting and sweating on him like a desperate woodland creature, her sounds becoming more animalistic as she toes ever closer. Something snaps within her and she’s dragged down into him, her vision suddenly swirling with his recent memories —

_Rey rests a hand on Kylo’s shoulder as he waits outside an open door listening to his colonels pledge their allegiance to Armitage Hux, saying they will follow their General wherever he may lead. … She hears the whispers of various First Order officers taking bets on how long until their Supreme Leader is sliced in half again after his embarrassing failure on Crait. … She stands behind Kylo in the surveillance bay as the video monitors dim and the techs fall to the floor. … She peeks over his shoulder to see his fingers key in decommission codes on a holopad, his hand shaking as he sends the order. … She kneels beside Kylo’s narrow bed in his private chambers, watches his come spurt over his stomach as he breathes her name._

— She grips his neck harder and for a few moments she doesn’t know who she is when her release racks through her limbs. Her thighs close in as her body clenches, her wetness sliding down over his cock as her moans coast over the empty forest floor. He thrusts up into her as she says his name and sighs over him, narrating the terms of her own end when she crests and bends down to breathe into his ear, 

“Good boys get to come, right Ben?”

She’s suddenly thrown out of his mind when he sits up to clutch her close to his form, almost suffocated by how hard he holds her against him as he jerks up inside her,

“Good boys get to come inside and take everything, right?”

She’s not sure what he means and leans her forehead against his neck as he bounces her over him, feeling the edges of him running forward to meet his own end when he whispers against her more,

“You even think about it by yourself, my come all up that tight tiny pussy of yours when you groan and take it —” He kisses her neck and drags his teeth against her throat when he slams her down roughly, her knees stuttering and digging into the ground. “— the little Jedi wants me to fill her up so nicely, likes feeling so small and being crammed so full.”

She knows he’s just about there, questions how he’s holding out now after brushing so close just before. She squirms in his grasp to free her arms, his own hands leaving crescent-mooned marks on her back when his request flutters through their bond. She slaps him hard enough that his head turns with the impact, leans back when she feels _again_ pass through her and smacks his other cheek.

“Do it again,” he says aloud and she abides.

The clap echoes into the Forest’s darkness as he unloads inside her, making a jarring grunting noise as he does. She feels it coating up where she ends, closes her eyes as she feels the reflection of his release run between her legs. Everything goes still as he comes down with her still wrapped around him, holding her in place to make sure it stays within her.

They fall asleep not too long afterwards, neither one putting back on their clothes to rest against the other’s skin. 

— — —

Rey lifts her head and recognizes the firepit in the main circle of camp, looks down to see she’s dressed and sitting on one of the large benches littered below the treehouses. There’s a detached sensation as if she’s floating when she scans over the wookiees standing apart from the roaring bonfire in the center. Their mouths move but she cannot hear any words, only registering a stretching tension throughout as the spectators stare at a large male by the blaze. Her stomach flips when she recognizes the wookiee from her prior dream, pacing in front of the fire with a bowcaster by his side and shaking his head. One of the others steps out with an open hand, maintaining a tentative posture and walking in closer.

The male wookiee screams, grabbing the end of a burning log from the fire and throwing it into the crowd. They disperse and one’s fur starts to erupt from the embers, rolling on the dirt as a female tries to stamp out the flames with her foot. The howls roar in Rey’s ears and her breaths become shallow when there’s a pressure on her hand. She turns to see Kylo sitting beside her and curls up next to him, unsure what it is that catches the unease in her chest and tells her to watch closely.

Kylo brings an arm around her and she leans into his embrace, lets him hold her as the female wookiee cries and begs the others to help her. There are murmurs of confusion and concern, a small child running from the circle to fetch water. The acrid scent of dirty burning hair fills Rey’s nostrils and she hears one of them say they need to leave to get help.

The large male shoots the bowcaster straight in the air and everyone is silenced. Rey grabs Kylo’s knee and feels a flash of wind over her face when the wookiee bellows,

_“NO ONE. IS. LEAVING.”_

The bench falls out from beneath them and Rey’s eyes open in the quiet tent, she sits up to see Kylo has awakened as well. Her heart still races as she lays back down and rests her head on his shoulder, letting him hold her close as she tries to fall back asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to my beta readers [elemie89](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elemie89) and [hellyjellybean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hellyjellybean).
> 
> Thank you so so so much for your encouragement and feedback. Have met some incredibly awesome and supportive people in this fandom and THANK YOU so much again for telling me to keep writing. Every view, kudos, bookmark, comment, and link is cherished.
> 
> Things start getting really real here as we creep closer to the end. Anticipate next update going up two or three Sundays from now, will not be posting a date again as I don't want to rush it. Thank you for joining our favorite space wizards on this sexy spooky adventure and hope you will enjoy the rollercoaster that's about to go over the hill....
> 
> Follow me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics)


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beware: A lot happens this chapter. Note that the tags have been updated and while the smut is intense it is completely consensual. There are two sections that may be particularly triggering for some readers that are addressed here and sectioned in-text as well.
> 
> [§] This is for seeing a murder through the eyes of the victim before he meets his end. It's important for the plot, there is no torture, and the death is quick.
> 
> [§§] This denotes an unsuccessful sexual assault attempt (NOT Kylo) where no one is physically touched, but the language and implication runs heavy & clear and has the potential to make a reader uncomfortable. The designated section itself is rather short; the reaction to it is longer and also drives the plot forward.
> 
> Didn't expect a month between updates, but this is the longest chapter yet and hope it does not disappoint.

Rey is surprised that the suns hang so low and heavy in the sky when she pokes her head out of the tent to see that it’s already mid-afternoon. She crawls back to Kylo and takes a blanket to drape it over her shoulders, the thin cloth providing minimal coverage over her bare skin. He stirs and turns over, his breathing quiet and steady in contrast to the small scratching noises of the daylit forest around them. Rey doesn’t understand how she slept for as long as she did, her body collapsed into a dreamless black space several minutes after her vision with the wookiees. She stretches her arms and watches the rise & fall of Kylo’s back as he continues to sleep, and Rey is already feeling impatient from losing most of their daylight. 

She presses her foot flat on his back to shake him. “Up.”

He stays still so she puts her sleeping clothes back on and walks out to their packs to find them strewn across the camp. Rey groans as she surveys the clearing, assuming an animal had rifled through their belongings during the night. She criticizes her carelessness in leaving them outside of the tent, having been too carried away last night to remember to bring them in before sleeping (a very young scavenger mistake to make, like that of a Jakku amateur). She kicks one of the rations tins on the ground and it rolls into another a few feet away. Rey takes another glance and realizes that none of the food appears to be missing. She pulls Kylo’s ankle when she crawls back into the tent, grabs the blanket tangled under his arm and throws his hooded cloak over his naked body.

“Up,” she repeats with a snap of her fingers as she sees him lift his head, facing away from her as he runs a hand through his hair. “We overslept.”

He appears more bleary than she anticipated. Rey notices shaded swaths of short unshaved hairs peppering his chin that he scratches as he glances about the tent as if he cannot recall where he lays. He sits up and the cloak falls over his lap as he turns to look at Rey.

“I don’t remember the last time I slept that long.”

She isn’t sure what he expects her to say, only noticing a forlorn haze flicker over his eyes. “Are you… well rested?”

He looks to the opened tent entrance and waits a few moments before answering. “I suppose so.”

“Good.” Rey claps her hands. “We have to pick up camp and move, we only have a few hours of daylight left.”

“There’s no rush,” he responds, reaching out to grab his pants and shuffle into them. He shakes his head as if to dissuade himself of something before peering out of the tent to evaluate the state of their camp. “Shouldn’t take long.”

Rey rolls her eyes. “Well I don’t have the luxury of taking my time, I’m not here on some —” She isn’t sure why she glances down to his crotch, but quickly looks back to his face. “— on some vacation.”

He leaves the tent and Rey watches him take his change of clothes from the ground, shaking the dirt off before putting them on. She rolls up the contents of the tent and tosses them outside, exits to see Kylo in his usual uniform. She works at untying the rope from the stakes as he refills his backpack. They work quietly and efficiently, switching off for Rey to collect her own things while he rolls the tent back up to return to his pack. She chides herself for not better surveying Kylo’s belongings while he was still asleep, realizes she barely took an inventory before it was all stashed back away. She sees him stuff the ends of white cloth strips into the front pocket of his bag as he remarks that he has nothing missing.

Rey bites her lip as she presses a blanket inside her pack. She confirms aloud that she’s not missing anything either.

— — —

They don’t encounter any wildlife as they continue heading northwest and Rey hears the skittering of fleeing footsteps all around them. They walk silently for an hour or so and Rey isn’t sure why today feels stranger than the day prior, it’s as if both of them have something they don’t want to say. She focuses on mapping their direction by tracking the setting suns, does not pause whenever Kylo stops to strip a vertical line of bark from a tree with the edge of his machete. Rey cannot decide whether she’s relieved or suspicious that he doesn’t ask anything about her destination, at times she looks back to confirm that he continues to follow.

They pass through a particularly dimmed portion of the woods, the canopy unusually thick above them. The forest’s natural noises dim in Rey’s ears and there’s a sharpened tone beneath the silence that resides. She halts mid-stride to rest her left hand against the nearest tree, shutting her eyes to listen more closely to the quiet as she breathes in deeply through her nose. She feels Kylo approach behind her, but does not hear his footsteps, instead wriggling her fingers in response to a small feathering touch on her wrist.

_Go see._

Rey opens her eyes and looks to her right, where the movement bid her to go. It’s still in a general northwestern direction yet somewhat off their original path, and she glances to the ground to consider whether to follow. She turns around and doesn’t anticipate Kylo being as close as he is, his eyes surveying her face for an explanation. The ringing tone hushes when Rey opens her mouth to speak.

“Did you hear that?”

“Yes.”

She hesitates briefly, not sure how to convey what crosses her mind. “Does it… bother you?”

“You’re less accustomed to hearing voices that aren’t yours.”

Rey blinks and knows there is something to be taken from this, but files it away for later review. She bites her lip and points to where the disembodied touch led. “We’re almost there.”

They tag all the trees in the tight circle, marking the one towards camp with a second horizontal score to turn them back. She looks up to chart the suns’ positions when they change course, takes note of the shifting sound of the running stream, and quickens her pace as she presses forward. Her pulse is sharp in her chest as she continues onward, compelled to rush up towards a single boulder in the center of a smattering of trees. She thinks she hears Kylo’s voice as she rushes forward towards the distant natural landmark, but cannot make out the words. The sound of her blood rushing in her veins rings loud in her ears and Rey can make out the shuffling sounds of her staff bouncing on her pack as she closes the distance.

“Rey —”

She swings her pack off her back when she reaches the boulder, it thumps loudly on the ground. She leans forward to rest her palm on the rock’s stippled surface, that same hushed whisper drawing her in without expressing it in words. Rey flattens her hand, her head swimming & her stomach dropping as a strong familiar grip grasps her shoulder and the Forest melts to black.

…

…

Rey turns back to see Kylo behind her, his fingers digging into the skin of her shoulder as a high-pitched scream rushes around her ankles and up over her knees & sternum like an embracing wind. It curls in tighter as it fills her throat and Rey is pushed forward into Kylo’s chest as a cough racks through her lungs. The wail persists as Rey keeps hacking up nothing and he whacks his hand hard on her back, causing her to lose her footing and fall forward.

She feels the fabric of his tunic on her cheek when her vision blurs again, her abdomen lurching when she realizes she’s _shaking_ — her entire body rattling as smoke fills her nostrils and a cacophony of shrieking voices burst out from the metal floor below her. She looks to her right but can barely move her arms, strains her feet to release them but they’re clasped by the ankles. In her periphery she can see Kylo struggle against the same shackles she does, feels the flip of an uncontrolled descent through her core.

Rey is able to look to her left and sees a woman chained, so frail that her limbs could slip through the cuffs. Her hollowed features are vacant, her lips pressed in forsaken acceptance of her fate as thin streams of tears pour from the corners of her eyes. The smoke is nauseating and the skin around the woman’s mouth seems to crack when she speaks; her voice is wounded and thin, yet bellows loudly in Rey’s ears:

“At least when I die I take them all with me —”

The room bursts and quakes with the boom of impact, flames shatter the walls and shoot across the floor. Rey screams as fire catches on the ends of her trousers and she struggles against her restraints to no avail, her legs boiling with the stench of burnt flesh when her body goes up in smoke. She turns to Kylo and sees him grit his teeth & shake his legs as he’s consumed by the same fire, strangely not screaming even as the ends of his hair start to singe. The scene melts with her skin, the wind and crash growing even louder, the flames gleaming even brighter — the pain that runs through Rey is unlike anything she’s felt before and she empties her lungs with a howl as she’s split in two — then everything stops with a flash of white light.

…

…

The woods are pitch black and Rey is on her hands & knees, looking down at a puddle of vomit when she gags from the smell and her belly lurches again. Everything spins as she retches up soured water, her entire body heaving as she does so. She holds still and shivers as a string of saliva drips from her lips to the mess on the ground, tears welling in the corners of her eyes as she gains her bearings. She sits back on her knees and looks over to her backpack & staff resting beside the boulder, trying to adjust her eyes to the night.

She looks up when Kylo coughs, sees him sitting in a similar position wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. His stomach’s contents are slopped in a pile next to him as well and his shoulders shudder when he shifts away from it. Their gazes meet silently and Rey tunes her ears to the trickling sound of the flowing stream. She counts her breaths to wait for one of them to speak, slowly stands to move away from the putrid scent of their mess and glances down at Kylo as he stares at the boulder.

“Water,” she says simply, pointing in the stream’s general direction before stepping over to the rock to crouch down and rifle through her pack.

She digs beneath her blankets to feel out the shapes in the darkness, hears Kylo come to stand and collect his things beside her. She removes a small portable lantern and fumbles to find the switch before turning it on. The harsh artificial white light illuminates much further than Rey had anticipated based on the item’s size, and she wraps part of the chain connected to the handle around her wrist like a bracelet. She walks past Kylo to start heading to the stream, and he follows closely behind. Rey sighs when the trees clear and she sees how high the moons have risen in the sky, unsure what to make of the missing time. She sits cross-legged on the stream’s bank, rests her pack to take out an empty canteen and doesn’t look at Kylo when he takes a seat beside her.

She leans forward to splash water over her face, doesn’t wipe it off when it drips down her neck and wets the collar of her shirt. She repeats the motions a couple times more, feels stray strands of hair sticking to her forehead when she wipes it with the back of her hand. She inhales deeply, watches the moonlit stream flow past them as she fiddles with a loose string on the hems of her trousers. She keeps her mind blank, hoping that an understanding of whatever just transpired would come to her on its own, still feeling the itch of phantom flames flickering over her shins. She turns to Kylo when she hears the metal crinkle of a rations tin being unsealed. Rey scrunches her nose as he pokes the pate with his index finger. 

“You’re… eating.” He holds the tin out to her as a silent offer and Rey shakes her head, surprises herself when she refuses the food. “Can’t get that burning flesh taste from my mouth.”

Kylo’s brow furrows and he sets down the tin, as if her words changed the flavor on his tongue. The continued silence between them makes Rey uncomfortable and she feels compelled to fill in the empty space, deciding to voice her suspicions aloud.

“That was Ashmead’s Lock,” she states. “The prison ship crash.”

“Centuries ago.” He nods and finally looks up to her face. “It’s still here.”

Rey raises an eyebrow, realizes she never did ask Kylo if he knew anything about the brief story Chewie told her. “What do you mean?”

“It’s still here,” he repeats, shifting his posture to sit up straighter. “Portions of the hull were used for constructing the Empire prison abandoned here after the Battle of Endor.”

Rey glances away and glares at the river, asks herself why Chewie left this part out of the story as Kylo continues, “Han Solo was involved in freeing the prisoners from stasis, most of them were sent to Chandrila. They attempted to assassinate New Republic leaders on Liberation Day, their actions apparently compelled by an unknown force.”

Kylo doesn’t elaborate and Rey doesn’t ask him to. She visibly winces when she fills her canteen and stands, focusing on two particular words in his tale. Her tone is sharp as she pats dirt off the bottom of her pants, swinging down to grab her pack,

“Your _father_ , you mean.”

Kylo looks at her blankly and she marches off with a huff, the light of her lantern swinging over the trees with her steps. She is distantly aware of the noises he makes as he gathers his things and comes up to join her, standing a few feet away as she crouches by the boulder to retrieve her staff. She doesn’t turn back and continues forward, knows she’s stabbing the ground just a little too hard with the end of her staff as she uses it as a walking stick. She realizes she’s rushing again in an effort to dispel the guilt twisting in her chest, shouts behind her as she speeds up her steps.

“Well _let’s go_ then _Kylo Ren._ ”

— — —

They walk for only ten minutes or so before the whispering starts, hushed tones exhaling into Rey’s ears beneath her clomping footsteps. Initially she ignores them, keeping her eyes trained to the ground to avoid the increasingly large roots bursting up from beneath the dirt. The voices pick up in volume but remain meaningless, making noises rather than phrases. Rey comes to a stop, turning about so quickly that the lantern on her wrist nearly swings into a tree.

“Do you hear that?” she demands the ground by Kylo’s legs, not looking to his face.

She watches his feet stop before he answers. “Yes.”

Rey shakes her head and scratches a spot behind her left ear, resting her weight on her staff. The whispers carry the same tune she heard back at the treehouses, a call to stand straight and look closer, to see where they may lead. Her gut becomes unsettled despite not eating earlier and she takes several deep breaths to recall where she is, glaring at Kylo and his apparent nonchalance. He seems so… unperturbed and she’s self-conscious of how strange her awareness feels, resting a hand on her stomach in a useless effort to halt the churning within her.

She has trouble focusing on formulating her words, feels silly as soon as she stops speaking: “Is it — Does this have something to do with the Force?”

He takes several steps forward and stops in front of Rey so she has to look up at him when he answers. “I don’t think so. Something that is stuck in between.” She stops herself from interrupting him here, biting the inside of her cheek. “Instead of passing on or passing through at death.”

Rey changes her stance on her walking stick, not wanting to admit she doesn’t understand what he means. She hopes her question doesn’t expose her ignorance. “You’re saying something… stuck them here.”

“Perhaps.” There’s a twitch in his left eye when he points to the path beyond them; she considers that maybe he doesn’t know what he means either. “Perhaps a Force sensitive prisoner couldn’t find a way through.”

“How would a Force sensitive individual…. Couldn’t they easily escape long before being onboard?” 

Kylo drops his hand. “How can a Force sensitive individual be a prisoner?” He raises his eyebrows. “You tell me.”

The implication registers immediately and she shoves him hard, her staff falling to the dirt beside their feet. She is disappointed not to see him stagger back, her efforts barely making a dent on his large form. She clears her throat and grabs her staff, walks past him in the direction where he pointed, her thoughts racing between the continuing voices and his words. It would have been wiser to decline his questions about Jakku the day prior.

“I’m not a _prisoner._ ” Rey turns back and marches up to Kylo, coming in close to press a finger up where she imagines his heart should be. “ _Not_ anymore.”

She doesn’t offer any time for him to respond before storming off on her prior course, her fists clenching around her staff and by her side. The whispers grow louder as she gains more distance from Kylo and she doesn’t turn back when she hears him call her name. The mere _suggestion_ that she lacks agency is absolutely _infuriating,_ even when referenced in an implied past tense — And the voices wind up louder still, finally pouring sentences into her ears, repeating her own mantra:

_You are no longer on Jakku._

And they’re right. She’s not. And she will not be made to feel as if she had much choice in the matter before only a handful of weeks ago, to be told by some sulking creature ten years her senior who had a family and a home and OPTIONS —

“Rey.”

She’s startled by Kylo’s hands grabbing her shoulders, lets him bring her in close against his chest. She stands with her back against him, his arm wrapped over her waist. Rey shuts her eyes as the chanting picks up until it’s a pin prodding her eardrums before dropping to a sudden silence. She pauses to hear the soft rhythm of her own breaths, doesn’t notice the beads of sweat that trail down her face. She cannot decide whether the voices themselves or their method of extinguishment is more contemptible, her eyes darting over the gnarled bark of the worshyrs’ trunks and the dirt winding between the trees. Rey squirms against Kylo’s grip when he leans down to pluck the lantern from her, yet keeps her hand limp as he unwinds the chain around her wrist.

“Stop.” His tone is mostly flat, but undercut by enough urgency to make Rey realize she’s ruffled him to some extent. “We’re here.”

She blinks a few times when he releases her and walks ahead, his dark silhouette looks like a wandering spectre in the halo of artificial light illuminating his surroundings. The lantern’s glow reveals hardened lines of refurbished metal, the materials dull & rusty from decades of inattention. Rey steps up beside Kylo when he comes to a pause, swallowing hard when the structure comes into full view. It’s approximately thirty feet high with a roof rounded to match the curves of the doomed ship. Rey tilts her head up to examine the Empire symbol burned into the surface above the yawning entrance, surprisingly recognizable despite being nestled in a twisted clutch of hole-ridden metal. She cannot tell where the recycled hull begins and the added construction ends, pressing her lips together as she treads closer to the entryway.

A nervous energy rustles around them as if they are being watched. Rey glances over her shoulder and speaks. “I’m not sure we’re alone.”

“Isn’t that the point?”

Kylo walks beneath the lintel into the antechamber, the lantern cutting through the pitch black darkness to reveal deep scratches peeling back the metal all over the walls. Rey’s breath catches in her throat when she steps into the room, knowing full well that this does not follow typical patterns of decay. It’s as if a strong clawed creature managed to puncture nearly every surface. The energy from outside seems to follow inward and Rey turns back to the trees visible through the unobstructed entrance.

A part of her screams to flee, knowing that whatever follows is strong enough to be felt at the treehouses (presuming this is not a dead end). There’s another part of her that knows she must stay for the Resistance’s sake at the very least, needs to settle finally whether they are in danger (she corrects herself: it’s for _Finn’s_ sake really). Then there’s the last part of her that is drawn in closer to graze her fingertips along the wall’s jagged edges to feel their barbs on her skin. Her touch is light to avoid drawing any blood, confirms the scratches were made without tools when she feels them. The same chill runs through her that she felt at camp before seeing Ematt’s bonfire, when she reminded herself not to heed unaccountable voices asking her to go outside. This _something_ in the Forest has both unnerved and excited her, silencing her voice or reminding her of her own power  & potential.

She must accept its invitation, for her own sake as well as the others.

She will not run.

Kylo clears his throat and Rey is startled from her daydreaming thoughts. She straightens up from the wall and faces him as he speaks. “It’s Force signature aligns with darkness. The entity could be sustaining itself with… the natural resonance in this area.” He pauses briefly. “That’s why it’s never ceased.”

Rey walks closer to Kylo with a raised eyebrow, noticing a new gloss to the lantern’s white light as if everything may swim at any moment. It’s intriguing rather than unsettling, throwing the space into a novel aesthetic she has not seen elsewhere. That flare of discovery creeps over her thoughts, the same desire to seek new planets and landscapes and treasures. Something emboldens her, prompts her to understand this place more deeply despite the growing intensity of the unseen stare over her form.

“Do you actually have a kriffing clue what you’re talking about?”

He glances towards a wall. “It’s a theory.”

“She meant it when she said that,” Rey offers. “That she’s taking others down with her. Until she gets through.” She reconsiders. “Or maybe she’s doing this for revenge. Or just for its own sake.”

Rey hasn’t verbally told Kylo about the more off-putting events back at the treehouses, wonders whether he gathered those memories or the emotional residue of the experiences when she granted him access to her mind. He does not ask how Rey knows what the words meant, or what “doing this” refers to. He just says,

“Possibly.”

There are two hallways that lead further down into the prison. The one on the right is collapsed a few feet in. The one on the left becomes more narrow as they continue until Rey is walking single-file behind Kylo, frequently looking behind them to see if they’re being followed. He halts when the entryway opens wider and Rey lightly pushes his back to urge him forward. He adjusts his grip on the lantern before ducking to enter the room, steps aside for Rey to come in.

The room is a little larger than the initial antechamber and the ceilings are higher inside despite the low doorway. There’s one small square cupboard leaned against the far wall with a circular handle like a padlock. A metal grate lays before an arch that leads deeper into the structure. Rey looks around the grate and bites her lip when she realizes there are rusted red smears all over portions of the floor. The stains are faded by various degrees, suggesting that the different patches of… of blood were left to dry at different times by separate events. She sees Kylo shift his jaw as he inspects the floor, stepping to the center of the room to gain a closer view.

“Is that the normal way to commune with the Dark Side of the Force?”

Kylo looks up from his feet to stare into Rey. If he recognizes her reference he doesn’t make it apparent. “You don’t co —” he begins to correct her and stops mid-sentence, restarting his response. “No. It’s not. Whatever is here doesn’t rely on Force sensitivity to wield influence. Your… _friends_ feel it too.”

He did gather something from her after all.

Rey crosses the room to stand with her toes at the edge of the grate and peers down, unable to see anything at the bottom of the yawning pit beneath. There’s a soft rustle of skittering feet in the hallway beyond the arched doorway, but the area is so dark that Rey cannot see what causes the sound. Another skitter comes from below, floating up from the grate. Rey steps back before kneeling, bends down to bring her nose close to the metal mesh to see what moves within. Her eyes adjust to the seemingly endless looming expanse below and despite not being able to make anything out in the darkness she —

She swears she sees something blink.

Rey sits up suddenly and rests her hand on her stomach as it starts churning again. A whisper flutters from the tunnel and there’s a tug to the closed cupboard to her left. She stands slowly and gazes down the hallway, hears Kylo say something behind her but doesn’t make out the words. She waits briefly before rushing to the cupboard, sprinting to kneel before it and pry open the unsealed door. The hinges squeak with the swift movement, Kylo calls her name once (then twice), and something roars to her right when the small door opens. Rey’s eyes widen when she looks inside and Kylo crouches beside her to see what rests within —

…

…

A young male wookiee child approaches the entryway of the abandoned prison on an early afternoon, glances back over his shoulder to see his father looking down at a clumsily-drawn map. He taps his walking stick on the ground and asks if this is the place, holding a breath as he waits for a response. His father nods and folds the paper, placing it into a pocket along the bowcaster’s holster that crosses his chest. He nods affirmatively and the child turns back to look up at the Empire crest above the door. His pulse beats rapidly, not wanting to press forward and find whatever it is his father is looking for — whatever it is that locks him in the sitting room with his books and urges him here.

…

…

A dark-haired humanoid woman sits up on a stretcher and shrieks, a youngish man and wookiee stagger back from her as she does. The man sweeps back to the stretcher and rests a hand on her back telling her it’s okay now, her oily hair hanging limply over her face when she looks down to her unshackled feet. His face comes into view under the dim lights of the cell block, where all the filing drawers of stretchers are opened from the walls. Rey recognizes the man’s features and the cadence of his voice when he asks the woman her name. Her whispered response is inaudible as she shakes her head.

Rey watches Han Solo return to Chewie’s side.

“Third screamer in a row that doesn’t remember their name. Empire must have been showing them something real nasty in those stasis chambers.”

…

…

[§]  
Water splashes over the edges of the large bucket as the wookiee child rushes back to camp. His legs and arms are exhausted from the effort, and his sides hurt in time with his shallow breaths. He feels drops of water wet the fur near his knees and he sees the smoke from the fire rising above the trees. He pushes forward until he makes it back to camp, a strange metallic smell filling his nose as he draws closer. His steps slow as the main circle of camp comes into view, for only his father is upright (up by the treehouses) and everyone else lays on the ground. 

His feet feel heavy as he walks towards his father, the stench of singed fur wafting through the breeze. No one is screaming and no one is moving, not even the crumpled wookiee being consumed by flames to the right of the firepit. The child adjusts his grip on the bucket and watches his father come down the nearest spiral staircase with his bowcaster ready in his hands. His steps thump loudly down to the Forest floor over the whispers of flickering embers; the child calls out to him, but he does not respond. 

The child moves to close the distance quicker with his father. His foot catches on something and he stumbles forward, all the water from the bucket spilling onto the ground. The boy comes to his knees and gasps, realizes his paws rest on a female’s arm but it’s limp and cold. He stands slowly and the bowcaster wound in her chest comes into full view; fresh blood trickles down into the matted patches of fur on her torso. His eyes flit over the camp to see vertical bolts sticking out of all the individuals sleeping on the dirt.

This can’t be real, he tells himself, looks up to see his father a few feet away and readying the trigger of his weapon. The child’s stomach flips with fear, but his feet stay planted to the ground. The fire is hot, the blood is clumping up in the dirt, everything smells bad, and tears start to roll down his cheeks. His hands tremble and he opens his mouth to say something, but no words come out.

His father speaks instead, bringing the sight of his bowcaster up to his eye,

_“NO ONE. IS. LEAVING.”_

A shot is fired and the child screams as the bolt flies forward.  
[§]

…

…

Rey is in a dark room whose borders she cannot see. Goosebumps raise over her arms and her steps make small splashing sounds in a very shallow unseen puddle. There’s yellow light filtering in through the grate above her and Rey cranes her neck to try and see into the room. She grits her teeth and calls Kylo’s name, irritated by her concern to find him. Something rustles behind her and she twirls to glimpse at its source, only facing a deeper darkness when she turns about. She walks further in away from the light, unable to discern any forms moving in the shadows.

A tiny whisper floats into her ear and cold fingers trail down her neck & collarbone. Its words curl down her throat to feed her and make her feel the things they share — the potential and desire they control now that they are no longer chained to another —

_Go see._

Rey lets the chill inside her mouth  
and it pours into her lips,  
presses them briefly with a soft kiss,  
as the darkness soaks through her pores  
and seeps into her bones.

…

…

— — —

A cold sweat lingers on Rey’s skin when she sits up and realizes she’s outside. She brings a hand to her chest and another up to her mouth, grazing her fingertips along her lips. Her heart beats quickly and she looks up to see the moons slid further across the night sky suggesting additional missing time. Her legs are restless and she stands to release the tension, turns to see hers and Kylo’s packs laying against the building beside the entrance, her staff resting in front of them innocently. Rey has no idea how they got there, hearing a whisper in the arched hallway before being overwhelmed by the vivid visions she can recall in detail. She doesn't know how she exited the prison. And she does not remember running to the cupboard to open the door and peer inside.

Rey turns to see Kylo sitting in the dirt several feet away, dropping his gloves to the ground. He shifts his weight & stands as she collects her breath and walks towards him, her legs carrying her forward before she has a chance to direct them. Rey feels warm despite the chill of nighttime air on her skin, the Forest’s canopy cloaking the flush on her cheeks like a well-guarded secret. A familiar curiosity flares and retreats up to unfurl between her legs, her thoughts racing with disjointed phrases.

— She’s aware of each small movement _her_ body makes as she presses a hand against his chest and comes up on her toes to feather kisses down his neck, her thoughts wandering to each time she seized the opportunity to cross another boundary with him — In these times when she presses her form forward and follows her own cues to let her body lead — He sighs with her easily and bends down to meet her lips, allowing other influences to bring them together —Something tells Rey to demonstrate this power that she wields, to show herself that she can guide the galaxy around her — And she accepts the actualization of this unintended result, for the last thing she expected was to leave the blood-stained ruins feeling _this_ way —

Kylo pulls back and places his hands on her shoulders, his gaze cast with a driven purpose when her chest sinks and the air sinks around them. Rey is surprised by how easily he opens the bond between them, not realizing that he knew how to do it too. Or perhaps he simply found a bit of unwound string to tug between them, having felt no resistance from her. Her mouth falls open as his breaths harden, picking up on the tension uncoiling between her thighs.

He glances over the surface of her mind and she closes her eyes. An image passes through: a request he doesn’t want to describe aloud, one he wouldn’t bring himself to admit to her in words. She opens them to see Kylo staring at his ungloved hand as he thumbs over Rey’s exposed collarbone. She shudders as she always does when he tests the connection in this way and sees Kylo waiting for her to speak. His touch wavers as he waits for her response, knows her reaction has the potential to unravel them. At this moment, at least for right now, she knows she holds the keys between them. She looks up to his face and considers.

“And if I do it… what will you do for me?”

“Anything,” he states without any hesitation.

“Anything,” she repeats.

“However you’ll have me.”

She nods, laying her hand behind his neck and running her fingers through his hair, whispering as if she may be heard. “Okay. But you have to give me a head start.”

Kylo’s eyes widen and he nods, reeling from her acceptance. Rey continues. “And… And you can get my clothes dirty, but you can’t tear them.”

“Yes,” he affirms.

Rey steps up to kiss him hard, her teeth pressing against his bottom lip. He wasn’t exaggerating when he said that he’d been thinking about her since Takodana — She reminds herself that she should be concerned, but it feels exhilarating instead —

— — —

The Forest feels empty as Rey runs and her footsteps thudding hard on the ground act as percussion for the steady sounds of her heavy breaths. She feels a twinge down the muscles of her legs as she moves, sprinting at a brisk pace but below full speed. A large root is avoided with a hop; patches of long grass swat her face as she passes through them; her clothes feel strange against her skin. She pauses in a clearing, looks back to see a red glow distantly behind her and waits for it to grow larger before moving again. Her mouth stretches with a small smile, her heart rushes in her chest and her limbs feel fuzzy as she races forward. A tension stretches through the open bond as a readied saber hums closer, Rey hears its weaving vibrations as vegetation is slashed aside in her wake.

She feels Kylo’s gaze on her as she flees — He shows her how small she seems among the trees without a weapon or companion, sensing his perception without his needing to send images or words. A flush of urgency passes through her as he looms closer, coded by his increasing desire to see her tiny form overwhelmed and crumpled beneath him. He’s overly aware of his solid grip on his saber, of the heavy sounds his boots make on the forest floor, of the way his hood creates a black frame around his vision and presents her like a scene to be played out before him — Rey changes course and he responds in turn, rapidly gaining on her despite her attempts to throw him off her trail. She wonders if he can track her by the hardness of her breaths or by the warmth between her legs, if he can sense her as she does him through their bond when he pursues her. 

She glances back again to assess his position and the toe of her boot snags on an unseen obstacle. She falls forward, her foot sliding out of the shoe wedged beneath a tree’s root. She is able to brace herself from most of the impact, feels tiny scrapes scattered over the palms of her hands when she takes them from the ground. Rey rolls over and grabs her boot to free it, but it’s shoved deeper in than she realized initially. His steps grow louder, the red halo of his saber glows brighter, and when Rey looks up to see his towering form marching towards her with his cloak rippling behind him it doesn’t take any acting for her body to urge her to run.

She yanks the boot free and throws it ahead of her, her socked foot falters and slides out behind her as she struggles to stand. She comes to her knees to push up on her weight and finds herself frozen in place, the hum of Kylo’s weapon only a few feet behind her. He speaks to her aloud as he draws closer,

“The traitor deserted you.”

Her face is illuminated by his lightsaber when he brings it close to her cheek, holding it steady in the space between her face and shoulder. Her breaths are deep from exertion; she strains her neck to view the blade, but is locked firmly in place.

“It’s just us now,” he continues.

But there’s an unspoken understanding that he can only hold her if she’ll let him and Rey breaks the illusion by sprinting forward.

She grins as she escapes, sweeping down to pick up her boot before picking up more speed. Her strides are long & sturdy on the uneven ground, a flicker of awareness plucks over her skin with each movement. She bounds to a nearby clearing lined by some thinner-trunked trees that sprung up amongst the worshyrs, where swaths of moonlight lay over some of the mossy patches nestling in the tangled roots. Kylo is not far behind and she stops at one of the thin trees, leaning on it with her hands behind her back. Her chest rises visibly with each deep inhale as she centers herself, watches him slow to a walk as he stalks closer.

_You won’t escape me again._

And despite the words he says and the part she’s agreed to play, Rey can recall very few times that she has felt as powerful as she does in this moment. (She remembers all the grateful faces revealed when she lifted the rocks on Crait, a recent time that feels like ancient history.) Her capabilities with the Force eliminates most of the physical imbalance between them and Kylo relies on her continued agreement to keep pushing forward. She’s the one providing this to _him_ after he betrayed this vulnerability by revealing how truly obsessed he’s been by her…. The consideration amuses her and peeks to the surface as a thin grin across her lips.

He approaches the edge of the clearing and Rey can see a sheen of sweat on his forehead when he pauses to shift his hold on his weapon. She closes her eyes and senses how tiny & helpless she appears like this, holding herself up against the tree and rubbing her thighs together anxiously. The smile does not leave when she meets his unwavering gaze as he stares down his prey, when he tells her,

_We’re not done yet._

His breaths sound strained even through the bond and she clenches up, feels a slickness between her when she does. When she breaks into laughter she isn’t sure if it’s directed at him or her own arousal, unsure why she’s so excited by something that strikes her as so strange. She doesn’t say the words he wants to hear, lets them fall off the edges of her dimming laughter,

“Catch me then.”

She springs forward and to the right in an attempt to run past him towards a darkened path, coming in just too close to his reach. He takes advantage of her feigned misstep immediately, lunges in to push her down to her knees and pulls her hair back to make her look up into his face. He holds the saber only several inches from her and she can feel the warmth of the buzzing static on her skin. He could kill her at this moment, bring the laser to her exposed neck and bury her in the woods. And she realizes that while she may not trust him, she does not fear him and instead stares up at him expectantly when he speaks.

“Tell me about the droid.”

She notices him shift his jaw before setting it in place; her scalp stings when he rebunches his hand. She blinks, unable to recall what she had actually said. “It’s a BB unit. With a… thermal hyperscan vindicator.”

_He's a BB unit with a selenium drive and a thermal hyperscan vindicator._

Rey wonders whether her glare appears differently when Kylo observes her from this angle, not addressing his correction. He disengages his weapon and the forest slips back into darkness without its illumination. Rey looks up to the canopy when Kylo releases her, hears him fumble with his pockets behind her. A pang of embarrassment cuts in her chest that is not her own and she realizes he’s considering that perhaps he revealed too much in reminding her of her words.

She brings her hand up to rub her neck and he catches her wrist, presses between her shoulder blades with his other hand to guide her to the ground. Rey lays flat on her stomach, cheek pressed against the dirt as he moves to crawl on top of her. He kneels over her body and digs her hand into the ground above her head, keeps his weight on his knees as he leans in to speak into her ear,

“The droid. It’s carrying a section of a navigational chart.”

Her cheeks flush when her cunt clenches up, a part of her still unsure what it is bringing her to this heightened state of needing to have him buried within her. Her hips tilt into the ground when he starts grinding against her ass, his cloak surrounding her like a curtain. The head of his cock pokes against the curves of her cheeks through his trousers as he tightens his grip on her wrist.

“We have the rest, but we need the last piece. And, somehow, you convinced the droid to show it to you.”

He sits up and crawls back, pops off her boot and tosses it toward the other. She does not resist when he tugs down her pants and strips them from her feet, her legs squirming when he grazes his gloved hand up the back of her thigh. He grabs her ass hard before shoving his hands between her knees to prod her legs open, taking two fingers to press against the wet spot of her underwear,

_You’re so hot for me I can feel it through the gloves._

He pushes in against the outline of her slit, drags his fingertips up and down to spread more of her slickness into the fabric. Her eyelids scrunch closed when she inhales sharply and he presents a suggestion through their bond.

_Tell me to stop._

_Don’t stop,_ she insists.

His gloves flop to the ground unceremoniously and he leans in to yank down her underwear, she swears she hears him inhale deeply after rolling them off her ankles. He kneels behind her with one knee set between her legs before her body is pushed hard into the ground by use of the Force; the pressure against her chest makes her breaths shallow, her movements frozen under his command. She tries to gasp when he pushes two fingers into her, but her position bends it into a breathless squeaking sound instead.

“You know I can take whatever I want,” he growls, shoving into her harder as he curls his fingers up inside. She tries to tighten up around them, but can’t, her face straining from the unsatisfying effort. The resonance of her halted shudders ripple beneath her skin as she senses how much she soaks over his knuckles through the bond, struggling to move to release some of the nervous energy racking inside her.

He slips his fingers out and wipes them against her tailbone, painting her sheen on her skin. “I know you’ve seen the map,” he continues, his words wavering amidst his uneven breaths. She squeezes her eyes shut when he pushes three fingers into her this time, clustered together and pressing in hard. “It’s in there. And now you’ll give it to me.”

Her head blurs and swims as she starts to get dizzy, her airflow further constricted when her body is pressed down just a bit further. Her jaw stings against the ground as he keeps shoving into her roughly, he draws his fingers out to slide them down and up beneath her pelvis to rub over her clit. Her limbs ache as she’s fixed in place, her cheeks burning when she whimpers feeling more tension building inside her. She remembers how he prompted her to beg for him in storage, senses his anticipation growing for her to do it again.

Her body is released and she gasps loudly for a gulp of air, props on her elbows to look over her shoulder. She narrows her eyes as she sees him peering intently at his hand between her open legs, the hood of his cloak slipping back enough for her to see him bite his cheek as he sticks his fingers inside her again.

He glances up when she huffs, “I’m not giving you anything.”

A small grin turns up the corners of his lips. She jerks forward and off his hand, starts to come up to a crawl before she’s thrown down again. The impact knocks the wind from her lungs and he’s on her again, grinding his hips on her ass more with one hand pressing down on her shoulder while the other pulls her hair. He bends in to run his lips and graze his teeth down her throat, bites her in the space where her shoulder begins.

“We’ll see,” he breathes in her ear. “When I’m through with you you’ll be giving me everything.”

He sits up, she hears him fiddle with his belt and set it aside while she struggles to move again. Her heart beats rapidly when he grabs her hands and pins them behind her back, shifting some of his weight on her when he binds her wrists. A simple fabric strip circles them three times before being tied off into a secure knot, he tugs on the restraint to test its strength and slips a finger between the cloth & skin to confirm it’s not overly-constricting. A hesitance passes through Rey that is not her own again and she prods him further.

_Don’t stop._

She’s frozen still and cannot see him, listens to the small sounds he makes in the endless trees as he shuffles down his pants and tells her,

_You’re perfect._

She rolls her eyes as he crawls over her, yanks her legs to prompt her up. She has difficulty coming to kneel with her hands bound behind her and he grabs her hips to bring her up to her knees. He presses down on her back to guide her face down to the ground until she’s bent down with her forehead on the dirt and her ass in the air. He slips two fingers inside her once more, skips a small breath when she tightens up around them.

“You’re so lonely. So afraid to leave.” He takes them out and she thinks she hears him lick them, her wet cunt feeling fuzzy in the cool air. “At night, desperate to sleep… you imagine an ocean.”

The forest is so quiet and devoid of the normal skitterings of wildlife that Rey wonders if they’re the only lifeforms on this entire planet, despite knowing it’s not the case. The cloth of his cloak brushes along her legs as he positions himself behind her, feels the bottom edges of his tunic against her thighs when he holds his cock and drags the tip along her entrance.

“The little Jedi doesn’t have to be alone,” he reminds her and she tries not to wriggle against his movements. “It’s just us now.”

He settles his hands on her hips when he pushes inside her, only a couple inches before he takes himself out with a short groan. There’s a telltale thwapping sound when he rubs himself afterwards and she can imagine his eyes gaping over her ready opening, so neatly offered for him to plug inside. She shifts her knees to wiggle her rear and a certain amount of shame runs through her when she realizes she’s desperate for him to fill her, wonders if he can see the trail of slickness that she swears beads onto her thighs. There’s something more primal in her desire this time versus the others, a heady urge slapping every misgiving from her mind and reminding her that she _wants_ this, even _needs_ this reminder of her tiny role in this galaxy as a humanoid female frantic to be devoured. 

He rubs down on her clit as he touches himself, and for a moment Rey recalls the darkness kissing her lips and pouring down into her mouth — immediately dismisses the intrusive thought that she should be wary of being so horny after such an interaction. Her mind races with her desire to be consumed, to feel herself stretched and strained around him, and she sighs as she lets down her guard,

“Please,” she says finally. “I need — I need to feel you inside me.” She knows he cannot see her face and asks herself if her features betray how truly hungry she is even as she tries to hide it, adds some words she thinks he may want to hear. “I don’t want to be alone anymore, Kylo.”

“Give me the map,” he reminds her, coming forward for another shallow thrust before slipping outside her. “You’ve seen it. It’s in there.”

“Get… Get out of my head.”

“Fine,” he responds, squeezing her ass with both hands before sliding them down to her sides for leverage. “We’ll do this your way then.”

Her mouth falls open when he fills her, her hand twitching in her binds to come down and reach for him behind her. He holds her tightly as her body bounces with his movements, shudders when he feels her clench around his cock. A pained moan escapes her lips as her forehead grinds against the ground, her cunt warm and yielding to him.

“Kriff, it’s so deep, I —”

“The map,” he manages to repeat despite his ragged breaths. “You convinced the droid to show it to you. You. A scavenger.” 

She winces hearing the term she so despises, knows he likely interpreted the sound as pleasurable instead. Her vision is tunneled by virtue of her position and Rey feels a twinge of discomfort in her neck when she tries to glance to her side. She ceases the effort and shuffles her hips to bounce back against him; the recognition of how constricted she lets herself be like this feels like a hollowness opening in her chest. She wants to come up on her hands and mewl while she plays with her clit, sends him an image of her arching her back on all fours and looking back to see the face he makes when he fucks her.

It seems to inspire him to speed up his pace, welting small spots in her skin as he thrusts into her. The air is still and the Forest’s darkness seems to cover them like a blanket, magnifying the claps of slapping skin in her ears and tuning her feverishly to the warmth swelling up between her legs and creeping inside her thighs. She notices a downward shift in the tone of his grunts as they become more bestial, tightening his grip further as he drives into her harder. She yelps when he slaps her ass and he responds with a sound befitting a non sentient lifeform, bending forward to yank her up by her bound wrists.

She moans wantonly when the shift changes where he hits her, suspended horizontally while still on her knees. She tastes flecks of dirt when she licks her lips and her shoulders ache as he tightens his grip on her wrists to hold her in place. She grits her teeth in an attempt to hold herself together, trying to subdue her unexpected creature-like compulsion for him to claim her as her sounds increase in volume. Her body tenses with the memory of his words in the transporter and she betrays herself aloud before she can remind herself to stop,

“Ruin me, Ben.”

He groans oddly, adjusts the fingers gripping her hips when she feels him build and twitch inside her as if prompted by her remark. He ruts against her hard, pushing her forward and wedging her knees deeper in the ground. An elated flicker coils in her ribs, as if an unsaid tension inside him has been released, and she finds herself wishing he doesn’t come right now when he’s edging her so close —

He stops suddenly and withdraws, bringing her up to hold her back against him. He bites her shoulder again and twists one of her covered breasts in his hand, sighs against her when she squeaks in response. He rubs his shaft between her legs and mutters in her ear,

“I will.”

She rocks her hips against him and closes her eyes, squirming against his grip but not wanting him to release her. He pushes her forward and starts to untie her wrists, he pants heavily as he nudges another suggestion to her, admitting that

_Kriff, I’ve been waiting for you to say that for so long._

She glances over to the copse of smaller trees a couple yards from them amongst the worshyrs in the clearing, looks over her shoulder to see a certain darkness set in his gaze. There are several seconds of silence as something passes between them before he lets her go, watches her lean back against one of the thinner trunks with her legs open on the ground. He approaches quickly, crouched between her knees with two white fabric strips stretched between his hands. She blushes as she realizes she’s panting too, isn’t sure why she can’t roll back despite that small voice in her head reminding her she should — and surprises herself by raising her own arms above her head against the tree.

_Don’t stop,_ she tells him instead, shuts her eyes as he leans in and takes her wrists. One strip binds her hands together and he stands to wrap the longer strip around the tree before tying it to fabric enclosing her wrists. She opens her eyes to see him crouch down before her again, reaching up to pull and test her restraints like he did before. He stares down into her eyes and pauses as if he expects her to say something before prying two fingers into her cunt again.

He shoves them in hard and she closes her knees around his hips with another moan, hears the small wet sounds her body makes when he slips them out and finds herself rocking her hips in their absence. He comes in to kiss her face and she responds furiously, taking him in as if they’re the only two left in this entire strange world. One of her legs start bouncing with an anxious energy — the smell of his sweat makes something roar inside her and she tells herself not to beg for it, to stop this right now, to remember when Kylo said it’s unwise to tempt things larger than both of them — and yet —

She jerks her head back quickly. “Please, I need you —” She sits back straighter, watches him lean away and glance up at her wrists tied above her head and doesn’t know why she can’t stop babbling despite a lack of intrusion in her mind. “Come inside me and make me yours.”

There’s that uncanny expression in his face again, a frenzy in his eyes like a man possessed when he stares down her body to the space between her legs and watches his fingers disappear inside. “You shouldn’t have escaped,” he says, wriggling within her —

_I’m going to completely fucking ruin you, Rey._

— He looks up to her face. “You need a teacher. There’s so much I can show you.” She ruts against his knuckles, shifting how she sits to quell the ache in her wrists. She remembers the first time she observed two creatures mating in heat around her eleventh year, scrunching her small freckled nose at the curious sight, and for the first time she feels like she can understand it.

_Please, Ben, I can’t stand this —_

_Say it. Like you mean it._

She blinks a moment when he withdraws his hand, she scoots away and doesn’t hold back when she kicks his shoulder. Her other foot misses his face when she tries again, fixes her features into what she hopes is a convincing glare when he pounces on her and hitches his hands beneath her knees to lift them.

“You’re a monster,” she hisses.

_Please,_ she contradicts through the bond, immediately self-conscious of her desperate tone.

Her breath skips when he bends her legs back against her and she settles her ankles on his shoulders. There are some seconds of awkward fumbling when he lines up with her entrance before lifting her hips from the ground to push into her. She immediately starts bouncing against him despite the strain on her wrists, a pain blossoming in her elbows and shoulders from the position when he adjusts his stance to gain deeper entry.

She’s never made noises quite like this, isn’t sure she recognizes her own sounds coasting over the stillness surrounding them. She pants and whimpers with his movements, twists against her binds and tells him she’s his — She feels how tight & sloppy she is against his cock and begs him to fuck her harder, imagines him spilling inside her when her body tenses again. He leans in to crumple her against herself more and his mouth falls open as she falls apart, telling her,

_Everyone will know you’re mine when I’m through with you._

The sting in her upper body heightens everything rushing through her, but the discomfort is enough that tears start to well in her eyes. She doesn’t tell him to stop as she builds forward and faster, a faint familiar humming dragging through her and making her body feels heavy. Her weight shifts as he drops one of his hands to bring it under her shirt and rest his palm on her stomach, his fingertips petting the soft skin.

_You won’t be able to hide it when you start to show._

He suggests something to her one last time, his eyes widening as he spirals closer to his own end. Her feet patter on his shoulders and a tension bears down in her chest, telling her to refuse him this time and not to say the words aloud —

_I have an implant,_ she feels compelled to remind him instead.

“So do I,” he huffs, which is not the response she expected. She can discern the ruddied evidence of effort on his face despite the darkness. The hood of his cloak slides off and she notices some of his hair sticking to his forehead when he continues. _Kriff, Rey, I’ll do anything. It’s not real. Just say it._

She does not answer and grits her teeth, squinting her eyes shut to focus on the drag of his cock inside her. Small whispers trickle into her ears that remind her he’d promised to return the favor (anything) when an untethered pressure drags through her clit like in the storage. He presses down on her belly and the darkness beneath the trees breathes to life around them like tendrils tugging her to the ground. She parts her lips to let it wrap inside and bury her, nudges her with the memory of her breathless words the first time she told him to come inside her. She remembers the spring in her feet as she dived into the cave, her body rushing as she’s built up again so rapidly — surprised by how close she is already —

_Go see._

She keens when the pressure runs circles over her swollen nub, her limbs jerking in response as a tide builds inside her. Tears fall down her cheeks as her vision swims, her shoulders & wrists burning, her skin sticking to the fabric of his tunic, her ankles rolling inward to tangle her toes in his hair when she cries out, 

“I want to give you an heir — I’m yours, Ben —”

Something breaks within her and she yelps as she comes, pouring his name in his ears when everything dims around her and her release statics beneath her skin. She moves against him wildly, moans loudly as he slams into her against the tree, her head is dizzy and a wetness rushes out from between her legs — leaking around his cock and slipping down the fronts of his thighs and he groans like… like a nocturnal desert creature as his body coils before releasing inside her. She gasps with him as he pushes in deeper, angling her hips up to guide him in to press up against where she ends. She squeezes down around him as he fills her, a warmth slicking inside as she clenches fists in her binds. His eyes are closed as he grits his teeth, features twisted with a single-minded focus to mark her as his as sweat trails down their bodies when he holds her in place. He thrusts inside her a couple times to work his seed in further as they come down, breaking into small shudders as he evens his breaths. A stillness settles in the air as she tilts back in response to let it pool and stick within her, his hand grazing over her navel and telling her to keep it all inside. He waits longer than he has previously, turns his head to kiss an ankle hooked over his shoulder, stares down at where they join to admire how he fits. She can see him dreamily picture sleeping beside her clutching her swollen body close to his chest.

He gently lays her hips on the ground as the bond breaks, and Rey is unable to meet his gaze. Her mind races without focus and her cheeks burn, closing her legs and staring at the trees over his shoulders. She bites down on the skin behind her bottom lip trying to center her thoughts when Kylo licks his thumb and rubs some dirt from her forehead.

“You’re a mess.”

She remains silent and blows a strand of hair out of her face. A soft breeze passes through the trees, carrying the stale soured smell of her sweat in her soil-caked shirt. She turns away from him to look at her dirtied kneecaps, counts a couple tiny droplets of dried blood where twigs poked through, itches to wash away all the evidence of their copulation and let it flow away in the stream. He waits for her to speak and she swats away a feeble attempt to read her inner monologue, inhaling sharply through her nose. He takes the hint and walks away to hike back into his pants and shoes, his features narrowing as he surveys the ground while putting on his gloves. There’s a visible change in his posture as he starts to pace around quickly, his hand laying on his holster as he crosses the area a second time.

He stops and turns to face her. “Do you see it?”

“See what?”

He picks up Rey’s pants & boots and tosses them in her general direction, checks the area beneath them. He returns to the tree and pats his hand all around the dirt, checking behind Rey’s back and telling her to lift up to see what she’s sitting on. She does not need the bond opened to tell he’s both confused and frustrated, his tone vexed and concerned when he asks,

“Do you see my lightsaber?”

She blinks and shakes her head. He stands and marches about the clearing again, his very movements becoming more irate as he continues looking around. He crouches down to look inside a patch of long grass, tears out a few clumps with clenched fists and grit teeth. It looks like he’s about to punch the thick sturdy trunk of a nearby worshyr before he halts his unarmed hand, visibly furious when he turns to face Rey.

“I can get the lantern,” she offers. “You were holding it when —”

“I don’t _need_ a kriffing lantern,” he snaps.

“It’s dark.”

“You don’t understand,” he shouts, alarming Rey by how quickly his anger escalates. “I can’t feel it. It’s not here.”

“Maybe —”

“Maybe kriffing _nothing,_ I can always sense it and I can’t.” He’s still yelling and glares in the direction they entered from. Evidently this is something highly unusual for him. “Someone was here.”

He storms off down their prior path, too distracted by his objective to hear Rey calling for him. “Don’t just leave me here!” She watches him rush away and disappear as she tries again. “Untie me first, nerf herder!”

She lets out a heavy sigh and hears Kylo shout something before wood snaps in the distance, presumes he’s off somewhere pitching a fit while tracking the hypothetical interloper. (It occurs to her this is the first time she’s really seen this, though Finn told her about Kylo’s known propensity for damaging property in fits of rage.) She looks down at her naked half as she considers what transpired between them, unsure how to square Kylo’s usefulness as a potential asset with his dramatic desire for her. She returns to when he pleaded with her to ask to bear him a child and an unsettling gloom opens in her chest when she realizes…

…when she realizes that she’s known Kylo no longer than she’s known the Resistance, that she’s been offering her body to a man significantly older than her who _killed his own father_ right in front of her only how many weeks ago — A man who fancies himself a king and chooses to run to the Dark that she let come inside her multiple times despite only having met him so shortly ago (even _told him to_ ). It never occurred to her quite this plainly before. The Force may be insisting they interact with one another, but escalating into a physical relationship, no, that had been her decision. She recalls his guarded expression when she snaked her hand down his pants the first time he appeared in her bed, touching herself in front of him in the cell, and leaving his unconscious body behind in Snoke’s throne room.

_What are you doing, Rey_

She doesn’t mind the snapping sounds of twigs breaking behind her as she struggles against her restraints, suddenly unsure whether camping with the Resistance or Kylo makes her more uncomfortable. She closes her eyes and draws her attention to the knotted strips of fabric, focuses the nervous energy inside her on slipping them loose. She counts her breaths and empties her thoughts to —

“I swear I heard some bitch moaning back here, you didn’t hear that?”

“No, just the same yelling you did.”

Rey’s eyes widen with a silent gasp when the distinctly humanoid words reach her ears. She sticks her legs straight out in front of her and crosses them at the knee to hide herself, adjusting how she sits in an attempt to resettle her shirt across her lap and cover the tufts of hair in between. The footsteps grow closer and she holds her breath as she redoubles her efforts to unwrap her wrists, absolutely certain she recognizes the voices despite not being able to place the names.

“There’s definitely someone here,” one of them says only a few feet behind her back as the illumination of a lantern’s beam floats into the clearing.

A distinctly sharp & different kind of mortification flips in Rey’s stomach when she accepts that she will be found like this, looks over in the direction Kylo left to wait and see what follows. She bites the inside of her cheek as the men approach, swallowing hard when they stop to face her —

“What the fuck?”

Rey looks up to see Namit and Cicer standing above her, eyebrows raised with their hands on their weapons. The harsh light of their lantern highlights the soil caked into the creases of their trousers and several long drips of blood staining the fronts of their shirts. Everything is silent as their eyes study the dirt smeared over parts of Rey’s face, exposed legs, and unkempt clothes. Namit chews his bottom lip as he leans in to yank the knots on Rey’s wrists, comes to a stand as he drops his hand from his blaster’s holster.

She works to maintain even breaths while her face _burns,_ the humiliation gnawing in her ribs growing with every passing second as no one speaks. Rey imagines being consumed by a sand worm bursting up from beneath the ground, her sudden disappearance a preferable fate to this terrible foreboding roiling about inside her. Cicer crouches down in front of her, loosening the bowcaster’s strap across his chest. Namit spits on the ground and Rey is unable to break away from Cicer’s gaze, unsettled by how his wide his pupils are despite being cast in a bright artificial light. Rey tries to keep her expression as plain as possible, recognizes the vastly different conclusions that can be made about her predicament depending on how one’s mind tend to wander.

“The Jedi herself” is all he says.

[§§]  
For a moment she believes they’ll be concerned that she’s been hurt, will stand to untie her and offer a drink of water. But Cicer’s thin lips curl up with a smirk and a chill presses up beneath her skin when he says,

“Funny running into you here.”

He glimpses down at her knees and shifts his weight on the balls of his feet. Rey blinks when he clicks his tongue and shakes his head, bringing up a hand to stroke his short greying-brown beard. He speaks with an airy quality in his tone with each word plucking a string in the tension felt in the clearing.

“Didn’t your parents tell you not to go around at night like this?”

He peeks at the v between her hips before looking up at her face and Rey narrows her features into a venomous glare as the Major’s smile grows wider. She presses her lips together and jerks her wrists, unable to detach herself from her place. His cold gaze on her form makes her body recoil, visibly shifting how she sits. Neither man moves, but there is something sinister in their detachedly curious energy that makes the ground seem to vibrate beneath her. Rey is confident she can fend them off even with her hands literally tied and hisses when Namit comes down to take a seat beside her calves.

“Keep your filthy hands away from me —”

“I heard you before, moaning like some bitch in heat.” Rey shakes her head when she hears Cicer repeat the phrase. “You let your buddy Dameron fuck you like this? You learn to be a kinky slut from him or from Skywalker?”

Rey snarls, flicking her hands to direct a small burst of energy towards both men that sends them back a few feet. Namit laughs and runs his hand through his hair; Cicer props up on his knees and comes back closer, stopping just beyond the bottoms of her feet. Rey uncrosses her legs and her heels grind in the dirt to scoot back, not caring that they can see her pussy if she can kick Cicer in the face. Her fingers flutter before she taps into the waves echoing beneath her, works to gather & build it in her clenched fists as Cicer leans in and reaches one hand forward —  
[§§]

A sharp _CRACK_ of snapping bone pierces through the clearing and Cicer’s face contorts with anguish as he howls, his arm wracked by a second bend between his elbow  & shoulder. He stands and hurtles backwards in shock, his arm dangling uselessly by his side as Namit is swept up and thrown against the nearest worshyr tree. His body slumps to the ground and he rolls his head to look up, his breaths sputtering & gurgling in his throat. The lantern rolls into a knot of roots and Cicer’s eyes dart around wildly as he bellows, his body swaying with his unbalanced steps.

Rey jerks her hands and shrinks back to perch against her tree, holding her breath when she watches Kylo stride up to Cicer with his hand outstretched. Kylo’s dark hair covers most of his face from her angle, but his seething expression is easy to picture as he leans forward into every step. Namit gasps stupidly and Cicer’s eyes widen with recognition as Kylo says,

“Your foul paws will never touch her.”

Another _CRACK_ echoes like a blaster’s shot when Cicer’s forearm crunches into two angles, his body contorting in pain as he stares at his crumpled arm. Cicer’s screaming rings in Rey’s ears when Kylo walks past him, thundering towards Namit who skitters and trips himself trying to stand. Namit makes a gagging sound when his body is raised and pinned back against the tree, bringing his hands up to his neck as he struggles to breathe and his feet kick around beneath him.

Cicer collapses on the ground and Rey can’t help but smirk when she watches him gaze upon his mangled limb in awe and terror as his shrieking grows more hoarse and strained. Kylo jerks Namit’s body forward and hurls him back against the tree again; his head impacts the wood with a thick thumping sound and Rey sees the man’s eyes soften and change. It’s difficult to determine whether he’s still conscious when Kylo releases him and he falls into a pile on the dirt. Kylo turns back to return to Cicer, who is brought to hover in the air with his one usable hand clawing at his constricted throat. 

“This is the company you choose to keep?” 

Rey knows Kylo’s words are for her despite his focus remaining trained on the Cicer. Kylo’s hand twists and the man’s head jerks to the side to stare at Rey with a vacant & fading expression. Namit’s coughing sounds like a wet splatter against his hand and Kylo glances to him a moment before turning back to look at Rey. Cicer’s head seems to bob up & down in time with Kylo’s words like a puppet — Kylo’s features are hardened by disgust & frustration as he goads her further —

“Waiting to be found with these lecherous traitors?”

Rey bites her lip when Kylo tosses Cicer forward to land on his twice-broken arm. There’s a shifting grinding noise when he flops across the dirt and Rey can see that he’s pissed himself, notices a dark patch pooling down the inseams of his trousers. Kylo walks in closer and crouches down to the Major’s side, only looking up when Rey shouts,

“Don’t kill them!” There’s a beat of silence when Kylo raises his eyebrows and Rey stammers as she continues, “I can’t — How, how do you expect me to go back to camp with two corpses?!”

She surprises herself by not appealing to some higher virtue, by not insisting that a larger point can be proven by quashing his anger and sparing their lives. She pictures returning to camp with scrapes & bruises on her limbs and the men’s absence triggering a search for their disfigured bodies to be found beneath the dirt. Kylo shakes his head and comes to stand, kicking Cicer in the ribs who whines pitifully when his form inches over the ground. 

Namit coughs again, his voice shaking and scattering when he blurts out, “You, you, the Jedi, out here —”

Kylo comes to the tree and starts untying the knots hooking Rey’s wrists to the trunk, neither one minding Namit’s words as he continues to speak.

“Out here, you traitor, selling — You’re selling us all out to the First Order.” He starts laughing hysterically and his body heaves, “The ship, your coming back with the kriffing ship — You, you Force freaks are fucking and we’re gonna die for finding out.” 

Namit’s head lolls onto his shoulder, wistfully watching Rey as she holds her wrists out to Kylo to unbind them. She looks down at his fingers as the knots slip through, unraveling slowly as Kylo rubs his thumbs over her skin. He bends down to kiss her forehead when she stands, resting his hands on her shoulders as he lingers just a few seconds too long. Rey wipes away a tear that trickles down her cheek, smearing a patch of dirt onto the back of her hand.

“I, I don’t want to die like this. Please. I won’t tell anyone you’re fucking, just please don’t kriffing kill me. It was — It was Cicer, not me, I wasn’t going, I wasn’t going to touch her I swear on my sister’s life, I wasn’t going to kriffing touch her, please don’t kill me —”

Rey walks away to pick up her clothes and get dressed, observes Kylo return to Namit as she hops back into her trousers and boots. Namit hides below Kylo’s looming form, staring up from the ground with a pathetically suppliant expression as he continues to beg for his life. Kylo reaches down and cuffs Namit by his collar and Rey cannot tell whether he uses the Force to assist him when he literally drags the man across the ground to toss him beside his companion. Cicer blubbers and quivers silently, tears pouring from his eyes and streaking down his cheeks & neck when Kylo rolls him over to face him. Kylo opens his hand and waves it in front of the gaping pair, all their noises & movements suddenly locked into silence.

“You will return to base and not remember what happened here.” Kylo’s voice is firm and unyielding with no breaks or slips in his pace. He shifts his jaw before he goes on. “You did not see me. You did not see the Jedi. I suggest you hurry back for medical attention, you nearly died when you fell from the cliff across the stream.”

Rey can feel the rise & fall of her chest as she takes shortened breaths, telling herself to ignore the flutter in her ribs that prods her to remember she can be as powerful as him. Namit and Cicer rise wordlessly, picking up their lantern and discarded weapons as they hobble out of the clearing. Namit clutches Cicer around the shoulders as the Major leans into him to support his weight, trudging away until they slip away into the darkness beneath the trees.

Kylo rushes to Rey, grabs her upper arms and nearly shakes her as he asks, “You won’t join me so you can run away to them? These are the people you’re willing to die for?”

Her hopes for a moment to decompress are immediately dashed, shaking her head furiously and wrestling herself free from his grasp. Rey steps backwards with her hands balled into fists by her sides, knows that _something_ about the two men wasn’t quite right and unsure of what she will find when she follows them back to camp. The dirt caking her skin starts to itch, her thoughts reeling between Finn’s concerned eyes and Kylo’s palm pressing down on her belly, unable to find her bearings with everything swirling around her.

“Join you for what?! To destroy planets for sport and brainwash more children into stormtrooper helmets to bow before you?” Rey’s voice rises as she speaks, starting to pace with her hands flying into the air. “Join you? I can’t even get rid of you! You’ve ruined everything, my training, my privacy, even ruined sex for me, you —” She isn’t sure who else to blame for all the conflicting feelings roiling within her, for the unnerving static running down her legs, for the unsettled gloom turning her stomach. “Making me lie to my _friends,_ making me hide from your _mother,_ making me —”

Rey realizes she’s crying and her words heave and echo through the trees as she shouts. Her shoulders still sting, her cunt is sore, and she remembers laying on her back in her AT-AT looking at the metal ceiling and hoping tonight she will dream again of having a greater life and purpose unto her own. She sees Connix’s raised eyebrows, Rose enthusiastically waving to the relay tower, Poe insisting the Resistance isn’t finished yet, and Leia’s knowing gaze as she stood outside her treehouse’s door. Rey pictures shuffling back to camp with her staff on her back, watching Finn bite his lip as she makes up some ridiculous excuse for how it was found.

“And now you’re telling me to join _you,_ to join the First Order and go against everything that I —”

Kylo runs up to Rey, holds her shoulders to halt her in place, leans down to look straight into her eyes and says,

“Run away with me.”

Everything stops and Kylo glances down at her lips as they fall open. “What?”

“Leave with me. The Resistance. The First Order. All of it.”

A breeze rustles through the trees and sweeps around Rey’s feet, she exhales slowly and looks to the ground. There are no whispers, no suggestions, absolutely nothing besides the darkness and the heaviness of his words hanging between them. She purses her lips and considers his offer, feels something unsettle and turn over inside her as she recalls her brief fantasy of being lost floating through the galaxy with Ben Solo.

“I — I can’t —”

She looks back to his face to see the same vulnerability she’s only seen a handful of times before, his eyes pleading for her to accept his proposal. She shifts her weight but lets him keep his hands on her shoulders, his fingers pressing harder as she delays her response.

“What will the First Order do without their Supreme Leader?”

“Who cares?” There’s a pause as he chooses his next words, peeking to Rey’s tree before turning back. “What we have is more than that.”

“Kylo, I… I barely even know you.”

He lifts his hands and turns away, walking to the middle of the clearing while shaking his head as if this is a minor detail. “The Force brings us together and you choose to dismiss it.”

Her heart leaps before she has a chance to consider, not wanting to close this door just yet. “No, I just — I… I need to think.” She bites the inside of her cheek and rests a hand over her stomach. “I need… I need some time.”

He runs a hand through his hair and kicks something in the dirt. “Two standard days. I’ll be coming to retrieve you in two days. Is that enough?”

Rey’s body is swimming, her heart is pounding, and a small sigh unfurls in her ear and traces down her throat.

“Yes.”

He walks past Rey and crouches down by her tree, his eyes narrowing when he finds his saber where she sat — the same place he checked twice before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to my beta readers [elemie89](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elemie89) and [hellyjellybean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hellyjellybean), I would be lost without them :)
> 
> Posted an inappropriate use of the Force [one-shot](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15133163) earlier this month if you're into that sort of thing. Unsure whether I will be doing another one-shot or Chapter 9 next.
> 
> Thank you again for every view, kudos, bookmark, comment, and piece of feedback. Have really been having so much fun writing this and so pleased to see you enjoy it too. Don't be shy letting me know what you think, come say hi to me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics). Stay calm and love Reylo <3


	9. Chapter 9

They walk back to the prison in silence to collect their belongings, tracking the way by their footsteps and the singed lines Kylo’s saber branded into the vegetation. Everything lays quiet and Rey sees her pack & staff resting by the entrance undisturbed, as if nothing had happened after they left the place. The shadows cast over the forest floor are lightening into shades of dark blue as Rey plucks her staff from the ground. She does not want to linger long and does not survey the area before setting off towards the path back to camp as Kylo follows closely behind. She keeps her gaze set firmly forward as she covers her lips with her teeth, tries to dismiss the comfort she feels knowing he is nearby. It’s not out of any desire or need for protection (she doesn’t have either), but because she doesn’t really mind his company.

Several more minutes pass as they share the stillness between them and despite all that just happened Rey finds that it’s peaceful to just be there with him walking through the woods. The same trees that towered over like knowing sentries seem to be less gnarled & harsh as the navy darkness fades into a brighter shade with impending daylight. Rey considers when exactly the count begins. She pauses to turn to her companion with her arms crossed over her chest.

“I’m going back to camp.” Rey looks to the ground and watches Kylo’s boots as they come to a stop. She does not look to his face when she continues, “It’ll be morning soon.”

His feet remain motionless and Rey glances up to meet his gaze, but this time he looks away to watch the empty trail unwinding behind her shoulders. Kylo shifts his hands lower on his backpack straps and simply tells her,

“I’ll take you back.”

Rey sputters with an exasperated sigh, hoping he notices the roll of her eyes when she shoves his upper arm as she walks past him. Her staff seems to bore into the ground with every step of its use as a walking stick, shaking her head as she reminds him,

“I can handle myself.”

She doesn’t really think Kylo doubts that, but she turns back to see him continuing to follow with a certain rigid posture honed from years of practice. She interprets his attempts to maintain a stoic expression, and Rey does not need the bond open to tell that he just doesn’t want to go quite yet. It’s easy to sense the general air of his energy, for them to feel much of the other without trying, and Rey isn’t sure if it’s the Force or not but — she cannot shake feeling that there’s something she’s been longing for, that she’s found here with Kylo in this special world that only they share where they can communicate without words. The thought is both hopeful yet disconcerting, and Rey becomes increasingly flustered by her own emotions before deciding not to speak.

She concludes she doesn’t really want him to go quite yet either.

Rey points her staff off-course and murmurs something about needing to wash up before striking off the path towards the nearby stream. She speeds up a little bit and Kylo has no trouble keeping up given the longer length of his strides. She doesn’t rush to flee him, but instead to draw closer to her destination. The canopy clears as she approaches the stream and Rey sees the sky growing brighter as the planet’s suns peek onto the horizon. She lays down her pack & staff on the grassy bank and disrobes as she watches the morning’s first lights flicker over the flowing water. It glimmers over the hushed chopped rivulets of churning liquid like bits of gold, scatters beams over the rock face directly across the way. The sky appears like a tapestry behind the treeline as pink & orange hues pour up into it and Rey tunes her ears to the meandering trickling sound accompanying the day’s arrival.

She hears Kylo shuffling beside her as she drops her clothes to the ground, but does not acknowledge his presence. She stares out at the scene before her, breathing deeply as she wonders if she remembers this place from somewhere before. She never saw a sunrise like this on Jakku.

_This all feels like a strange dream._

Rey steps forward and dips the toes of one of her feet into the stream, grimacing with a chill that runs through her. Goosebumps prickle over her flesh as she steps down into the water, keeping her arms above the surface until the water is above her waist. She doesn’t move out further (doesn’t trust herself to be able to tread above if she goes in too deeply) and brings the rest of her body down as she kneels on the soft river bottom to be submerged above her shoulders. She holds her breath and plugs her nose before bringing her head under the water, staying below to feel it coating and spreading out over every inch of skin, flaking away the drying bits of dirt on her legs & knees. Rey breaks above the surface to take a breath and splash water onto her face; she runs her hands through her hair and shakes away a stray piece of bark. Her body rushes with the sensation of submersion, tingling with the still-new experience of so much water at once. Her lungs feel larger and her limbs feel longer as she takes it all in.

Something flutters inside her and Rey turns about to see Kylo sitting on the grass still, his belongings resting beside him. His knees are bent as he watches her quietly, doesn’t make any effort to hide how he studies her bare form. She lets her hair down and rolls the stretchy bands down onto her wrists, the small wet movements of her body sloshing loudly as everything stays quiet all around them. There are no whispers or cracking branches to disrupt the soft cycles of the running stream or to jar Rey from her reverie. The suns have climbed up further and Rey looks at her hands beneath the clear water, their outlines blurred by the dawn’s last shadows.

Rey comes to stand with a wide smile. She glances down to watch droplets of water drip from her wet hair and maze down over breasts, sees one stall over her pebbled nipple. She looks back up to Kylo and he tenses his jaw, but doesn’t say anything. Rey points to him before dropping her hand back into the water, breaking the silence instead,

“You too.”

She splashes lightly and he smirks, starting to kick off his boots when Rey faces away and dips back under the water. She counts the seconds as she holds her breath, bobs up to the surface to gasp for air before going down and trying again. She tries to open her eyes and squishes them back closed as soon as they sting, prompting some air bubbles from between her lips. Rey jumps up for a breath and drops back down, weaves her free hand above her head to feel how her hair floats in soft stringy bands all around her. The numbers tick up in her head and she shudders as fingers ghost over her shoulder, which prompts her to turn about as she rises above the surface.

Kylo is already close beside her, crouching in the stream with his clothes laid out on the grass. Rey splashes towards him and he pushes away from her to slip beneath the water. He comes back up to kneel on the river‘s bottom, leans in to rub his thumb across Rey’s forehead as his tongue darts across his lips. His ears look large when his wet hair sticks against them, and she finds her eyes wandering over the scar circuiting down his face & chest when he says,

“Thought this would come off, but….” He kneads the pad of his finger over the spot again. “Left a scrape behind.”

Rey looks away to blush down towards the water with a frown that’s more playful than serious. She’s unable to piece all her thoughts together yet is keenly aware of a warm feeling filling the spaces between her ribs, trying to push her beside him despite their close proximity. Rey wrings out her hair and focuses on the rise & fall of her chest as she inhales each molecule of cool crisp air like a portion; she rubs her thighs together despite the dull soreness remaining between them. Her palms seem strangely far away when she studies the clusters of tiny red scratches from when she tripped over the raised root. Her wrists seem small when she sees the pinkened patches on their sides from yanking hard against the fabric strips. Rey grazes her fingertips over her forehead to trace the small cut across her skin and lets Kylo bring her near when he tugs her closer arm.

“I shouldn’t have left you there,” he tells her and Rey nods wordlessly, physically sensing his heavy regret when he opens his side just long enough to give her a glimpse into his mind. She supposes this is his version of an apology, takes him at his word as she wriggles her toes in the mud and tries to erase the image of Cicer’s cracked limb from her thoughts.

Rey bites the inside of her cheek when Kylo places his hands on her hips and guides her to sit on his lap in the stream. She rests her back against his chest and she sighs as his hands run down her shoulders, her ribs, and settle on her stomach. The Forest is hushed & tranquil as they watch the suns rise and something unwinds between them when he holds her close. For a few moments she considers that maybe it wouldn’t be all that bad to hide away somewhere like this (and she could call herself Liza again and maybe he’d introduce himself as Ben or as something else). She closes her eyes and imagines making a home with him instead of with a place, running among the stars to stay ahead of those who will surely follow until their urgency fades with time. Rey would become a distant memory as she grows stronger and more powerful — She pictures herself storming away from Kylo after a heated & difficult lesson; sweating as she helps build a shelter & trains with the fixed saber; kissing him against a window in a very tall building like the holovids of Coruscant; leaning against him with his arm around her shoulder as they watch the suns rise over somewhere new; and turning over as she sleeps soundly by his side —

Rey stops herself as she realizes she’s getting carried away, her face flushing with the hope that Kylo did not sense or see her thoughts.

His fingers tap and flutter on her belly beneath the water and he shifts his weight so that her hips sit higher, bringing his face down to rest his nose in her hair. She shudders when he clutches her close and opens the bond between them, a small sound escaping her parted lips as he drags his hand up towards her torso & the ricochet of her own flesh on his creeps within her. She leans back with her face tilted up to kiss him, pulls away before deepening it to turn herself around. She straddles him with her knees on either side of his hips, her back facing the sunrise; he brings a hand down to shift his soft cock between them, leans to bring her in again. Rey wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him gently to taste his lips and to feel all his skin pressed against her atop the reflection of hers on his. Her breaths harden as her breasts push up against his chest, but their touches are soft & slow as their hands wander over the other. His fingers are deliberate & delicate as they pepper over her ribs, spine, and pelvis.

They’ve barely spoken since she said to give her two days, but she realizes they don’t really need to — at least not right now — and she lets the rush in her veins say more than her words could.

Rey closes her eyes again and rests her forehead on his shoulder, waits for something to break between them and wrest them apart. But nothing does and they sit silently like this listening to the other breathe until the water feels too cold and their toes are pruned. She wonders what he will do if she says no.

— — —

Kylo holds her shoulders and looks down into her eyes before he departs, his features arranged into a somber expression when he tells her he’ll see her tomorrow night when the moons reach their peak. Rey knows he’s speaking aloud, but his words register as moods instead of phrases as something unsteadies & buzzes the air around her. He tells her he can always come sooner and Rey tilts her head with a lopsided smile as his gloved hand coasts up her arm and over her neck to smudge her cheek.

“It’ll be soon enough,” she says despite her uncertainty, both irked & comforted by his concern as well as by her own misgivings about the consequences of his suggestion (which dwell far more on abandoning Finn in particular than the Resistance at large). She flings the image from her mind, well aware she has plenty of time to revisit it on her journey back to camp. Her toes wiggle as she remembers running Kylo’s hair between them with her ankles pattering on his shoulders; her face feels warm as she recalls his low chuckle when listening to her tell a tale; her chest tightens with the picture of Kylo insisting that what they have is bigger than the war.

And she asks aloud where he will be, to quell these dreamlike memories, bothered by how irrational the feelings seem despite the ease of falling into them.

“Around,” he replies with a shrug. “Not far. Not too close. It doesn’t matter.”

It does matter to Rey yet she does not press it, instead sweeping with Kylo as he bends in to wrap an arm around her back. He kisses her hard and runs his fingers through her damp hair. His nails stutter over her scalp and her palms coast down his chest, raise back up to hold his cheeks while she pretends the circumstances are different between them. He clutches her hands in his when he breaks their embrace, presses one last kiss on her forehead as the bond fades between them.

“Be careful, Rey.”

She nods and walks away along the path they charted together, turning back every so often until his silhouette disappears among the trees. She expects to feel some sort of absence, but instead only notices the immediacy of what she needs to figure out before returning to camp.

Her exhales are heavy and full of meaning in her ears as she wanders back and considers what happens next, her treehouse bed seeming so small & far away as she remembers laying her head on Kylo in the moonlit tent. Rey ambles through the woods for a few minutes before coming to sit on a mossy stump, slinging her pack between her legs as she rifles through it for a medikit. Her fingers stumble over the smooth edges and she opens the box on her knees to take out a bacta gel patch. She holds the individually-wrapped packet between her teeth as she straps her staff onto her bag, deciding that she will hide it before returning to camp instead of having to provide an explanation.

Rey tears the packet open and squirts some of the goo onto her thumb; she globs it over the cut on her forehead before rubbing her hands together to spread it onto her palms & wrists. She swings her pack on and her ears tune to the loose bobbling of her staff on her bag as she trudges closer to the Resistance, trying to piece together a coherent version of what she experienced at the prison to find a way to explain why she knows they should not stay in the treehouses much longer. Rey imagines standing in front of everyone at the head of the meeting circle and she tenses with the thought that she will see Namit & Cicer at camp — the two of them blissfully unaware of the true depths of their darkness, their recent transgression neatly excised from their memories.

Her gaze flickers over everyone else in attendance at the imagined meeting as Connix nods slowly with sober acceptance, but a thoughtfully suspicious expression (perhaps she’s telling herself that Rey is such a useful _asset_ ). Rey glances at the members of High Command seated behind her as D’Acy marks something down on her list (always the good soldier) and Ematt crosses his arms (maybe he’d scoff or ask her to elaborate). Rey pretends that Leia isn’t there to avoid the thought of her wary eyes (how much does she know) and has Chewie attending instead (even though he didn’t come last time). A pang of guilt twists in her chest when she considers that Chewie left out everything he did because he didn’t want to upset her (he must have done it because he cares), asks herself who else knows what happened with the wookiees at the lodge. She wonders how Chewie can see her as so delicate, does another headcount of remaining Resistance members as she rests her hand on her belly and reminds herself to breathe.

The nervousness is distant and strange, the folding thoughts are constant and intrusive, and relief runs through her when a familiar voice outside herself comes close to pour into her ear,

_Go see._

It’s followed by the soft sound of solid & hesitant footsteps and Rey comes to a halt, leaning her weight forward as she waits for the noises again. Blades of tall grass rustle as they tangle, dead leaves crinkle as they crumple beneath something’s feet, and Rey remains paused for several seconds before hiding behind a wide trunk to obscure her position on the makeshift path. She presses her back against the worshyr’s bark as she holds still and the passing breeze wavers beneath her skin like the static of a brewing storm. Rey brings her hand up onto her staff as the sounds draw closer and she visualizes being beneath the water as she counts to ten —

She peeks out from behind the tree to see Finn weaving down the path sporting a comically lopsided backpack. He stops to trace one of the carved markings on a nearby trunk with two fingers before shrugging and continuing on his way. Rey’s heart swells and leaps, she runs out from her perch with an excited shout and not remembering her staff on her back,

“Finn!”

She beams as she runs towards him and him towards her, meeting halfway to fall into a rushed embrace. His arms clutch her close and Rey smiles as she hugs him back, welcomed by his reassuring presence and relieved that he is the first Resistance member she sees. Rey leans back and Finn’s eyes widen as they settle on her forehead, he brings his hands down to flip over Rey’s and sees the scrapes matted on her palms,

“You’re hurt, are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she replies with a grin, hoping the flush in her chest has not risen to her cheeks. “I just tripped back there, nothing a little gel can’t fix.”

Finn moves and his pack seems to bobble with him. “I’m so glad you’re okay.” He glances up the path behind Rey’s shoulder and she thinks she sees him gulp. “I came out here right away when —” He looks back to Rey. “Holdo’s men came back to camp before dawn and they were… _mangled._ ”

She hopes her face is convincingly worried when she widens her eyes and raises her eyebrows. “Mangled?”

“Yeah.” Finn shifts his weight and turns back towards the direction from which he came. “Here, let’s head back.”

Rey nods and comes up to walk by Finn’s side, bringing her hands up to the straps of her pack as she observes his profile. Finn bites his lip and keeps looking down to the ground, as if parsing out what he wants to say. An odd churning feeling runs through Rey as she becomes aware of the shuffling sound of her staff on her pack, the small feathered wisps growing louder & louder in her ears.

She clears her throat to smother the tension unreeling within her. “How far are we from camp?”

Finn shields his eyes as he looks up towards the canopy. “Two — three hours tops.”

Rey blinks when her stomach falls and her veins run cold. It took her about a day’s time to reach the prison from camp when she adds it altogether and Kylo just departed only…. Rey’s neck cranes up to chart the suns and confirms there is no missing time, looking back over her shoulder to see the carved trunks unwind behind her as far back as she can see. An uneasiness creeps up her calves when she insists to herself that she had not traveled in circles, she checked the sky the whole time and now… and now some wet strands of hair clump together at the base of her neck, reminding her that she left so shortly ago.

“Made it easy to find you.” Finn gestures towards one of the marked worshyrs they pass on their way back and Rey turns forward, tries to find a way to fill the hollow sensation opening in her torso.

(— Three hours tops. Did they get lost or did the camp grow closer or —)

Rey ekes out a small smile when she looks back to Finn. “To find my way home.”

Finn leans in and lowers his voice as if sharing a secret, despite no one being in earshot. “About that. Might not be too much longer. Everyone’s on edge since Namit & Cicer came back, think even Ematt got spooked.”

“What happened?” She swears her voice raises a little too high at the end of her question, supposes it only sounds that way in her own ears and not necessarily Finn’s.

He glances to the ground and keeps speaking in that same hushed tone. “Came back to camp barely able to walk, Namit’s got this crunchy gash on the back of his head and keeps slurring his words, marks all over his neck and back, holding up Cicer whose arm —” Finn’s nose scrunches up. “Broken twice but at these… at these angles, some bruised ribs, and the smell….”

He visibly shudders at the memory and Rey tries to remember how to react, meekly asking, “How?”

“That’s the thing.” Finn straightens up, looking behind them briefly as if to confirm they’re not being followed. “They say they fell off a cliff ledge, but Namit’s arms are fine and Cicer — no way a fall broke it like that.” Finn makes a chopping motion between his wrist & elbow then up between his elbow & shoulder. “Clean cuts. Like a snap, not a crunch. That’s what the medidroid said to 3PO at least.”

“Something happen to them before they fell?” Rey offers.

“Probably,” Finn agrees. “But they don’t remember anything else.”

A breeze withers through the trees and the canopy’s leaves rustle above them, flickering small patches of sunlight over the dirt. They remind Rey of beams focusing points to create a map of where every wookiee body lay in her vision, and she swallows before opening her mouth to speak having finally formulated her words —

“Everyone will be so relieved you’re safe,” Finn mentions. “Connix was saying that D’Acy wants you to…” He’s studying Rey’s face again. “To, you know, take a look. See if you can find out what happened.”

Rey clenches her jaw as her footsteps ring in her ears. The leaves’ noises grow until they flutter like an army of wings, and that low humming pitch rests beneath it all as if to prod her legs forward and remind her to keep walking straight ahead. _An asset,_ she considers, a mere tool of convenience, a strange being to be honed for its use and abilities — Rey glances down at her fingernails to confirm there’s no more sand wedged beneath and this time the words that follow seem to come from herself despite the voice’s strange timbre,

_You are no longer on Jakku._

Rey nods affirmatively and sees Finn’s eyes darting between her staff and the ground.

— — — 

Minneau and Sharp salute to Rey and Finn as they enter the main circle of camp, where some men play sabaac by the firepit and Koo Millham naps on one of oversized chairs. Two women walk side-by-side on a rope bridge, Bollie Prindel & What’s-His-Face are playing catch in the clearing, and no one seems to be tending to their usual posts. The firepit’s coals are dimmed but burning low, and whoever tossed in the most recent kindling forgot to strip it of its fragrant bark first. It gives the air a charred and choppy sort of smell that crinkles Rey’s nose as they cross the circle to the spiral stairs nearest to her treehouse. Finn’s hands waver between his pockets & his pack’s straps as if unsure which is the more natural placement, and he waits for Rey to cut ahead of him to walk up the stairs.

They drop their things in their treehouses, Rey rests her packed bag and staff against the wall below her bed, and Finn pauses a moment to study Salaka Kuchimba’s crumpled sheets before they exit his room. Rey looks down at the main circle below to observe as she crosses the rope bridges. Everyone’s gait is noticeably more hunched than before, and there’s a certain insistent uneasiness curling within Rey when she realizes she’s pleased she cannot spot any members of High Command. Or Connix.

It doesn’t feel right to be relieved —

_What does it matter if you leave tomorrow night_

— and Rey bites her lip as Finn says they should go see Rose in the communications house. Rey agrees and this time she chooses to follow, finding herself glancing to her left towards the borders of the old growth forest as if the trees may reach out to tap her if left unobserved. She’s looking behind her shoulder when Finn knocks on the frame of the open door, turns forward to see Rose sitting at the small table alone with one of the radars pieced apart over the floor. Her face brightens with a wide and genuine smile when she bounces up to hug Rey. It’s quick & tight and does not linger long; she sweeps over to Finn to hold his arms and peck his lips.

“Didn’t think you’d be back so soon,” Rose bubbles, parting away to sit cross-legged beside the dissected device. Finn joins immediately while Rose sweeps her hand over the pieces as if presenting a prize, meeting Rey’s eyes as she stands apart by the entryway. Rose continues, “Breaking this down I should be able to use some of this to boost signal range for comms. New game plan as of today at least.”

Rey covers her lips with her teeth and takes a seat across from Rose while Finn chimes in. “We’re trashing the local radar?”

“Guess so.” Rose shrugs as she bends forward to pluck a small gray square between her two fingers. “Still have the little box in the relay tower. Links are still shot and people are getting antsy.”

“No luck on the ships?” Finn asks.

“Nope. Same error still when we tried to send out on both of them.” Rose places the piece back in the pile, grazing her fingers over a nearly-identical one right beside it. “Kaydel said Riva Rosetta was crying this morning about sending a message to her sister. Ematt still won’t let her go to Kachirho.”

Rey isn’t sure whether to be impressed or bewildered that Rosetta continues to fall into rank. Rey scratches her shoulder to find a place for her hands, resets her jaw as if she’s about to speak but thinks better of suggesting insubordination so openly around Rose.

“Has she asked Leia?” Rey says instead.

Rose puts her hands in her lap and glances to Finn before responding. Her tone is oddly somber, nearly swallowing the end of every word. “Organa’s been in her room with 3PO, has barely come out since the day you went.”

Rose explains further and Rey wonders if she puts too much effort into maintaining a neutral expression as she nods periodically. In the morning Rey left and Leia did not attend the general assembly that afternoon. Ematt & D’Acy didn’t address it at all and that evening Leia wandered down to the main circle in her long sleeping clothes to stare into the firepit, oblivious to all those who tried to speak with her. Except for Poe, who linked his arm with Leia’s and walked her back up the spiral stairs — It makes Rey think of how Kylo appeared like a dark spectre as he entered the prison with her lantern, imagines Leia trudging up slowly like a floating wraith in white clothes. Eighteen people overslept the next morning. Rose overheard two techs saying that _they_ overheard Ematt  & D’Acy whispering to one another in the mess hall about Leia.

“What were they saying?” Rey asks when Rose pauses a moment to wring her hands before setting them back on her knees.

Rose looks to the entryway as if to confirm that no one stands watch before she answers. “D’Acy was saying we should leave and Ematt was saying that he doesn’t think we should and Organa doesn’t want to either.” Rose shakes her head before her next words come out in a rush, like she isn’t sure whether to say them as her cheeks flush. “Kaydel said not to tell them about this,” she continues with a gesture towards the components on the floor. “I don’t know if Ematt knows we’re trying to send messages —”

Rose stops herself mid-sentence and turns to Finn, her eternal smile fading into a crestfallen line. Rey bites her lip and picks up a gear to give her fingers something to do. She isn’t sure she wants to ask what comes next, but it seems like the natural question. “But Leia said this was temporary?”

“I know,” Rose whispers as she shifts her weight and it seems so strange to see this anchor of optimism with such a quietly fraught expression. “The short list. Don’t know what happened to it.”

Rey realizes she’s barely looked at Finn this whole time when he clears his throat, having been absorbed in Rose’s updates and the radar’s guts instead. She questions why he didn’t tell her any of this on their walk back and files it away for later review. Finn’s brows are furrowed as if trying to concentrate on a long computation with more than a few moving parts.

“I saw Poe leaving the forest this morning as I was going in —”

“You saw Poe?” Rose raises her eyebrows. “I haven’t seen him at all since, except that time when I saw him going into the woods when I was coming back from storage.”

Finn shrugs. “Yeah, he seemed like himself. Mostly.” But he doesn’t elaborate and Rey isn’t sure whether to press him or not. “Said that when he took Leia up he asked her about the short list.”

Rose seems to perk up at that, but Finn’s expression remains unchanged when he meets Rey’s eyes.

“Doesn’t want to leave because she’s waiting for her son.”

Finn pauses a moment before he looks down to his feet and Rey twirls the gear between her fingers to feel the teeth press into her skin. Her chest tightens and her face feels cold, as if all the blood fled to her feet instead of her cheeks.

Rose blinks a couple times with her lips parted open. “Really?”

He nods. “Said she sent a message off to him. For ships. Knows he got it because she felt him nearby. Poe’s convinced she’s absolutely gone.”

Rose whispers as if she’s wondering the same thing but is too ashamed to admit it aloud. “Has anyone said anything about —”

“I don’t know.”

All of them are silent as a nearby rope bridge creaks with the passing breeze. Rose exhales through her nose with a heaviness weighing her shoulders down as the suggestion that they’re stranded without purpose becomes more real. Rey tries not to notice that Finn keeps glancing between her face and his own restless hands.

— — —

Rey does not linger long and returns to her treehouse, sits at the edge of her bed in the empty room with her pack between her feet as she opens it up to shuffle around inside. She digs beneath the blankets at the top to reach in blindly, making a conscious decision not to unpack her bag quite yet. She finds one half of the saber and a couple rations tins before a change of clothes, crosses the room to close the window and undress while facing the shutters. She notices some dirt flake off her pants as they drop to the floor and a small bruise budding by her left hipbone. Her tongue darts over her lips as she depresses the spot with one finger to feel the flaring sting, brings it up to run over her neck as she tells herself that Finn would have made a more obvious expression if she was marked there as well. Her palms are mostly healed and the scrape reduced to a thin line that does not feel like it will scar over if she keeps her hands away.

Rey reaches over to grab her shirt when the door opens, she jumps and haphazardly covers herself with the fabric.

“Sorry!”

Rey turns around to see Rose with her eyes averted towards the ground, she apologizes again as she scurries to grab something from beneath her bed before hurrying out and shutting the door.

Rey breathes out slowly before she finishes changing, stuffs the dirty clothes in the front of her pack instead of hanging them to be washed later. She takes out whichever text her hand settles on first in the bag, sits cross-legged on her bed to lay the book open between her knees. She flips to the back binding to find another grid, this time pointed into a twelve-sided shape, and she unfocuses her gaze until the doubled image appears like before. It takes longer for the grids to merge than the first time and Rey credits this to her own meandering assessments about the individual who told her how to do it.

She thumbs through the book without choosing any place in particular, sees all the text sheened in a dimmed glow as she skims the now-legible words and doesn’t bother to retain their meaning. The tome seems to channel the energy vibrating in the air around her, diffuses it over the pronouncements scattered over the pages. It floats & hangs about like it waits for Rey to shape its intentions and the contradiction insists on presenting itself rather opaquely:

(— that despite all the control that this gift has brought her, she isn’t sure she likes the idea of a metaphysical substrate prodding her to lay by someone’s side, insisting on hurling someone else’s presence upon her while literally placing him in her bed —)

And she cannot decide if Kylo is driven by infatuation or something more, nor can she determine if her temptation to leave is the result of her own desires or the ambitions of another. Yet it’s unfeeling & empty when she muses on the condition of the camp and the state of the Resistance at large; it’s more like a dropped sensation in her knees than a yearning in her heart to follow what’s supposed to be right.

_Better to leave now than keep watching all hope fade and disappear._

_Even Rose seems worried._

Rey closes the book and holds it to her chest, tells herself she’s less accustomed to voices that are not her own despite the reiteration of her own inner dialogue in her own voice. It’s easier to blame the Forest than accept that perhaps she’s not as good a person as everyone here assumes her to be. Someone who is strong, grounded, determined, resourceful, … and loyal.

_You have the tools to decipher your own powers regardless of where you sleep._

_You are no longer owned by another and the galaxy is a very large place._

Rey returns the book to her pack as she reminds herself verbally “you barely know him,” sees Tanner’s speeder disappearing on the horizon the day he promised to come back and sweep her away to a better life. Back then the choice was clear, as it always was on Jakku, and Rey finds her hands wriggling nervously in her pockets as she crosses the rope bridges outside. She looks to the ground when she passes Cova Nell, who has nothing to offer but a knowing smile that lingers with Rey all the way to the mess hall.

A group of four leaves the hall with packets in their hands as Rey enters, surprised to see it mostly deserted at this hour. C3PO fumbles picking up rations tins that have fallen from the stacks to the ground and Rey crosses the room to assist, his gushing greetings & gratitude feeling entirely unwarranted. He leaves to return to Leia and Rey takes her seat in the empty room. Peeling the ration tin opens reminds her of burning flesh, of when Kylo found his appetite so easily after the vision of the crashing ship, and Rey is staring at Poe’s usual spot in the room as if he may materialize to offer her a seat. But she receives a less welcomed visitor instead, one who makes her presence known with an enthusiastic greeting as she crosses the threshold.

“Ah, the Jedi has returned,” Connix says with a smile as Rey looks up from her pate. “Glad to see you’re safe, Rey.”

Connix holds a red fruit in her hand and Rey glances back to the table with the rations tins to confirm she did not miss them before. The lieutenant saunters past Rey to retrieve her own portion and the bite she takes as she returns to Rey’s bench seems to echo throughout the room. Connix seats herself across from Rey, rests her elbows on the table with her canned lunch between them. 

“Hi Kaydel.”

Connix reaches up and fiddles with one of the buns on the top of her head as she chews and swallows, keeping her eyes fixed on Rey. “Finn was really worried about you when Namit and Cicer came back this morning. Thought he might knock out Ematt before getting the all clear.”

Rey nods and pinches some of her pate between two fingers. “Found me quickly, was already on my way back to camp.”

“Always have luck on your side,” Connix replies with an exaggerated wink that prompts Rey to start eating her bite so she doesn’t have to think of something to say. Connix leans up from the table. “Don’t know if you’ve seen D’Acy yet, but she wanted me to tell you debrief is delayed ‘til tomorrow.”

Rey swallows. “Knows I’m back already?” She takes another helping with her fingers, sees Connix glance between her own fork and Rey’s hand.

“News travels fast,” Connix states with a shrug. “I’d ask if you ran into anything out there, but probably best you wait until debrief. In case anything is classified.”

She pauses here as if she expects Rey to confide in her or to divulge some information. Rey cannot tell which, deciding to remain silent either way as she takes her time breaking down the soft protein fibers between her teeth. She meets Connix’s eyes and it’s quiet for another moment before the lieutenant reopens the conversation.

“Finn tell you about D’Acy’s idea?”

“To ‘take a look?’” Rey asks with raised eyebrows.

Connix nods and crosses her arms. “It’s our best shot of rattling Ematt. Find out what really happened to them. Don’t know what else we got to convince him to leave.”

Rey bites the inside of her cheek, shifts her feet beneath the table. She can’t have them remember what happened. “I’m not sure I can do it.” She looks down to Connix’s hands. “I don’t really know how.”

Connix stares at the rations tins behind Rey’s shoulder for several beats, her expression crossing between disappointment & acceptance, as if she had not anticipated this response. Her features soften into genuine concern when she meets Rey’s eyes.

“It’s worth trying at least, right? We’re… We really need you, Rey.”

“I’ll try my best.”

Connix sighs as she stands, places her tin in her pocket. “Well, I’ll be rooting for you. Hope this works.”

Her words of encouragement are couched in a tone of defeat. Rey stares at Connix’s back as she leaves the mess hall, her shoulders slouching as she takes another bite of fruit and exits through the open doorway.

— — —

Rey spends two hours in the relay tower after Riva Rosetta taps her shoulder outside the mess hall and asks for her to take over, going to look for the assigned mechanic who never showed. Rey watches the treeline instead of the figures below and the worshyrs at the start of the Forest’s border to her left seem to shiver with the soft winds that pass through. Their leaves rustle in Rey’s ears despite the distance, at moments pretends the soft pattering sounds beneath are Kylo’s footsteps. She clenches her jaw as she practices closing her mind into a blank white slate, remembers there is a chance Leia could be present at tomorrow’s debrief if they don’t cross paths before then. The time passes quickly as Rey falls in and out of her trance and the suns slide lower towards the horizon. It takes several moments for her to acknowledge the assigned mechanic when he appears breathlessly in the door’s frame, his eyes darting down to the local radar box as he rummages in his pockets. He knocks on the frame and smiles to Rey with a quick apology and she rises wordlessly to walk past him to return to her treehouse.

Rey revisits the same text from earlier, unlocks its words and skims blankly like before. Rose’s forlorn frown and Finn’s wary tone refuse to leave the forefront of Rey’s mind, their dejected expressions reminding Rey she needs to find a way to convince High Command that what she saw was real — that the despair she reads from all those around her is no coincidence, that there’s a reason for the tense energy throughout the camp. She keeps returning to Ematt burning the books and determines that even if she leaves, she has to find a way to convince them that the Resistance should go too.

Even if it’s without her.

 _You can’t be seriously considering this,_ she tells herself multiple times as she spends the remainder of the daylight hours alone in her room, switching between this book and another from her pack to look at the pictures. The only voice she hears are her own racing thoughts trying to piece together how to best proceed tomorrow with High Command, considers the possibility that they all already know what happened there. And may have little faith in a theory that relies on visions and her “feeling like she was followed” and “somehow not herself at certain points.” Rey surprises herself by idly entertaining the possibility of what would happen were she to leave them here with the Forest and let its inhabitant run its course — but quickly pushes the unsettling thought out of her mind.

…

...

She picks her head up and everything feels blurry, not realizing she fell asleep until she’s already waking up and the afternoon has darkened to evening. The book lays open on Rey’s chest and as she becomes more alert she recognizes the picture from the mosaic floor on Ahch-To. There are murmurs of light hearted conversations and even some peels of laughter coming up from the main circle below the treehouses, both against the familiar backdrop of crackling flames and a winding spoke. Namit and Cicer may not be hunting, but evidently someone else went instead.

Rey sits up and lets down her messed hair, is tying it back up when the door creaks open slowly before Rose comes in with Finn and switches on a low light. Rey squints a little bit and adjusts to the illumination, blinking a few times as she brings her hands down and smooths her shirt.

“Hey, you’re up,” Rose greets with a smile and a tiny wave.

Finn’s hands stay in his pockets as he asks softly, “Are you feeling okay?”

Rey swings her legs over the side of the bed, resting her feet on the floor as she stretches her arms. “I’m fine, just tired. Guess I needed to catch up.”

Finn nods to the open window. “Did you want to get some dinner?”

She isn’t sure she can look anyone in the eye quite yet, but does want to move around a bit. “Maybe later. I’ll walk you to the stairs.”

Finn shifts his weight on his feet as they wait for Rey to place her book under the floorboard. She looks down at her hands as she comes to stand, sees that her palms & wrists have healed. Rey closes the light in the treehouse as she walks out behind Finn, letting Rose lead their way along the bridges. Rey runs her fingers over the ropes and one of the fibers catches on her skin, prompting her to look up. The sky is clear and she sees the moons beginning to peel above the treeline, casting the woods in a silvery green above the orange glow from the firepit below. The trio stop at the head of the stairs, Rose says “see you later” and Finn just offers a silent nod before they descend.

Rey exhales slowly and turns back to her treehouse, her stomach more unsettled than empty as her glimpses towards the towering worshyrs are narrated by the shuffling and indiscernible words floating up from below. She pauses to look down on the Forest’s floor from the bridge, her back facing the firepit, as if the dirt might scatter & breathe at any moment. She lingers briefly, remaining still until a flash of bright orange appears in her field of vision.

Rey straightens up and covers her lips with her teeth as she watches Poe slip between the trees, running a hand through his hair and staring at his feet. He does not follow her path, which starts out by the clearing, instead entering the Forest directly from the main circle. Rey considers that she has not spoken to him since returning to camp, but he did speak to Leia about —

Rey’s feet are taking her back to the landing before she tells them, her soft shuffling sounds ringing heavily in her ears as she comes down the spiral stairs. She looks over her shoulder and no one seems to notice that she’s come down, save for Connix who meets her eyes briefly before Rey jogs into the woods. She swallows hard as the sounds from camp dim and fade into distant chatter, following the upturned dirt left by Poe’s footsteps to determine where to follow.

It only takes a few minutes for Rey to catch up. She stops to tune her ears to the sound of muffled breaths, rests her hand on the nearest trunk to silence her movements and determine the source. She bites her lip as the heaving noises become more distinct and Rey recognizes the half hearted attempt to… to stifle tears. Her heart drops as she presses forward, finds Poe sitting on a fallen log with his head in his hands.

He looks up. His eyes are soft & glassy. A wet streak dries on his face in the cool night air. Poe cracks a feeble attempt at a smile. “Ah, the Madam Jedi.”

“Are… are you okay?” Rey asks plainly as she walks closer, her steps hesitant and uncertain.

Poe chuckles, “I hope so.”

A breeze crinkles the canopy above them as if responding to Poe directly. There’s a detached distance in how he observes Rey, placing his primary focus on the empty space beside her. Rey glances over but doesn’t see whatever Poe is looking at as he brings his hand up to take his necklace from his shirt and fiddle with his ring. His tone is measured yet anxious as he speaks.

“They all blame me, you know.” The leaves come down to a still silence. “For all this.”

Rey isn’t sure what he means exactly, but has an idea. “That’s… that’s not true. The First Order took out our forces and ships on Crait.”

The words feel heavy as they fall from her lips. A twisting sensation unfurls between her ribs, prodding her to recall who directed the First Order to do so after she left him unconscious on the floor. She scratches the space where her neck meets her shoulders, surprised to see Poe shake his head.

“There should have been more of us there to begin with, you’ve heard what they say.” He meets Rey’s eyes as he continues. “If I hadn’t… If I hadn’t let Finn and Rose go, they wouldn’t have found the transporters going down. If I listened to Leia and turned back we wouldn’t have lost all those bombers, we took out the ship, sure, and also lost how many — And Rose, I don’t even know how she looks at me.”

“That’s — Poe, you can’t blame yourself for this, that’s just not true.” She pauses before emphasizing, “It’s not your fault, Poe.”

“Then why —” He halts his words and gestures towards the air by Rey. “Can you see her too?”

“See… see who?”

Poe doesn’t seem to hear Rey, keeps speaking aloud as if it’s more for himself than for her. “Every night I come in here, every night Tallie asks… Tallie asks me why I let her die.” He looks up to the sky and talks to it instead. “She blames me for all of it.”

Rey tries to reel him back. “Poe, this is war. She… she was a soldier, she knew that this could —”

Suddenly Poe comes to stand and rushes up to Rey, reaches out to the space beside her and keeps going. “I can’t let the Resistance down again, if we stay here… we have to get everyone out of here, no matter what it takes.”

He nods to the air and turns to face Rey, his face desperate for some confirmation. Rey exhales slowly through her nose, tries to steady her nerves as she stays silent, unsure what to say.

“You have to help me, Rey.”

She nods wordlessly and rests a hand on his shoulder as he breathes deeply and looks down to the forest floor.

— — —

Rey asks Poe to come back to camp and he declines, she glances over her shoulder a couple times and offers a small wave as she walks away. She’s not sure that he notices, sitting back down on his log and listlessly staring at the endless trees. Rey wets her lips and her hands retreat to her pockets as she returns to the main circle, where the crowd has thinned out as lights flicker on in various treehouse windows. She does not spot Finn and Rose, but does see Ematt looking into the flames at the center of the circle as he tears a bite of meat from his kabob. He nods to Rey and she skitters away up the stairs.

Her treehouse is still dark when she enters and Rey turns on the light to see Rose’s sheets undisturbed, assumes her roommate is off somewhere with Finn. Perhaps they sit at the meeting circle with their arms linked as they smile & kiss below the stars and it makes Rey think of the broken saber in her pack. She questions whether she should have left Poe there, wonders what Finn is thinking. Rey decides that while Connix’s concern is genuine, she doesn’t particularly appreciate the assumption that her abilities are tools to claim before even asking if it’s okay.

She kneels before her bag and opens it up to take out one of the other books, moving her hand about towards the edges of the pack as… as she starts to feel nauseous when she notices their absence inside. Rey gasps and pulls out the blanket from the top to get a better look, confirms that none of the texts are present. Her pulse races and her eyes sting as she leaps to her bed and yanks up the floorboard to find nothing beneath.

All the Jedi texts are gone.

Rey is unable to focus on anything but the dread taking over her body like a sickness rolling in waves, she crawls on hands & knees across the room to look under Rose’s bed. She presses on every floorboard and find no loose ones, jumps up to search every space in the room. It doesn’t take terribly long given the small area and the limited amount of belongings she and Rose own. Rey keeps glancing between the window and the door as if the perpetrator will materialize if she looks at just the right time.

And she realizes she’s putting away the last of her things in her bag, the few possessions she has left in the treehouse retreating beneath the blanket she flops back on the top. She zips up the pack and tries to count her breaths to regain her bearings, to try and sort out where they can possibly be at camp. Rey flops down on her bed staring up at the ceiling with a hand over her heart as it thumps loudly in her ears.

They expect her to help them and then betray her. They claim ownership over her powers and her maps to unlocking them further. They say they’re her friends, that this is her home, and then go through her things and take her most priceless possessions — Rey doesn’t know why she’s so certain someone at camp has taken them, the conclusion keeps gnawing behind her mind’s eye despite a lack of evidence to support it — And those same words tumble from the window to lull her to sleep as she lays on her stomach and cries into her pillow, wishing she was anywhere else but here —

_Go see._

…

...

Rey bolts up in her bed as someone slams a fist against the door, darts her eyes around the dark room to see Rose sitting up in her bed as well. The women meet one another’s gaze as the knocking resumes, the knob clinking as someone keeps trying the locked door.

“Hey, it’s me, please let me in —”

Rose jumps up to open the door before Finn finishes his sentence, he stumbles into the room with his hand on his chest trying to catch his breath. Rose embraces him by the entryway as Rey rises to turn on the light, she stands a few feet from the pair with her arms crossed over her chest and her eyes widened with trepidation. Finn places his arm over Rose’s shoulder as she guides him to move over the floor and sit on the edge of her bed, whispering that he’s okay as his steps shuffle unevenly.

Rey sits on her own bed across from them, folds her hands in her lap as Finn calms down. His face is drained, his posture is defensive, and it’s clear that whatever brought him to their room at this hour left him spooked.

“What happened?” Rose asks again as Finn shakes his head.

“I’m… I’m not sure….”

Rose rests a hand on Finn’s back and he exhales shakily as he stares at the floor. He glances up to meet Rey’s eyes before looking back down to his feet, measuring his words and tone carefully as he speaks.

“Kuchimba… Told you how he was knocking on the wall beside his bed the past two nights, woke me up again and this time he —” Finn wrings his hands as Rose steadies hers. “He was above my bed. With a pillow over my face.” Finn turns away to stare at the open door towards the darkness yawning in its frame. “I sat up and shoved him off and he —”

Rey feels the floor open beneath her as Finn continues.

“He kriffing came at me with his hands, he tried to kriffing choke me so I knocked him out and I… I didn’t know where to go so I went to the empty bed.” Finn bites his lip and Rey recalls the scratch marks all over the walls of that room. “Laid down to — I don’t know, figure out what to do or what just happened and I closed my eyes and…”

Finn shakes his head as if trying to dispel the memory from his mind and convince himself it’s not real.

“I’m laying there and I felt — I felt a hand resting on my forehead and telling me to be okay and I saw… I opened my eyes and saw my mother.” He squints his eyes shut for a few seconds before running a hand over his hair. “As clear as you are to me right now. For a minute. And then she left.”

His words hang in the air like mobiles on strings, creaking and bending the mood of the room. No one can meet each other’s gaze as Finn breathes slowly and Rose freezes in apparent shock. Rey shifts her weight and crosses her legs, remembers when Finn saw his mother walking in the woods that time they were training. Everything is still as a branch snaps in the distance.

Rose is the first one to speak, but it’s barely a whisper. “We have to tell High Command. About Kuchimba. That he —”

“That he tried to kill me while I was sleeping,” Finn finishes as he clears his throat, his small cough sounding a little dry.

Rey manages to find a way to stand on her feet, keeping guarded as she offers, “Do you want some water?”

“Good idea,” Rose agrees as Finn nods softly and Rey exits the treehouse to collect some pre-filled canteens from storage.

She doesn’t think to close the door, having no intention on dawdling during her errand. Her chest tightens as she takes quick steps that make the bridges shake & creak. Something tells Rey to hurry along and get back, the suggestion insistent enough that she doesn’t bother turning on the light in storage and fumbles through the darkened room again. She curses as her knee knocks against a downed crate, falling forward and catching herself by one of the shelves on the wall. Rey finds the canteens right in front of her, recognizing their fluted cylindrical shape before grabbing a few. They bobble between her hands as she unlatches and resecures the door, returning to her treehouse more slowly as to not drop the canteens and have them roll from the bridges to the ground below. The water sloshes softly in their metal tins and the leaves are rustling again, the combination of sounds prompting Rey to stall her steps.

Most of the treehouses are dark and silent as if the entire camp is asleep. The light from the open door of Rey’s treehouse welcomes her like a beacon yet repels her like a waiting cell, unable to declutter the swirling feelings tumbling inside her. She credits it to the shock of Finn’s story, shakes her head to shoo away the creeping consideration that it’s intuition instead. Rey stops beside Cova Nell & Koo Millham’s closed window, shifting her hold on the canteens as she perks her ears to Finn and Rose’s low voices.

Rey is unable to make out the words, holds her breath as she draws closer to the entryway. She plants precise steps along the bridge to stifle any sounds and pauses to confirm they haven’t noticed her inside. Rey waits several more seconds before sliding down to sit with her back resting against the outside of her treehouse. The canteens lay in her lap as she scratches as an itch behind her ear, perching where Finn & Rose cannot see her. Rey is prodded to wait just a moment more and her eyes widen as she picks up her name:

“Do you think Rey’s okay?” Rose’s voice is quiet and small. The mattress makes a noise when one of them shifts their weight. 

“She’s just going to storage.” Finn’s reply isn’t very certain, as if he skirts around something else.

“No, I mean…” Rose is barely louder than a whisper. “She just seems… off since she’s come back to camp. I, ah I didn’t mean to, but I walked in on her earlier. And it wasn’t just the thing on her forehead, there were bruises on her hip.”

Rey’s face burns in the heavy darkness when it occurs to her that she didn’t even check her own backside thoroughly. There’s some silence before Finn responds. “She seemed off when we were walking back, yeah.”

“No, I don’t mean… not tired. Like Poe after we saw him go in — like she’s distracted or —”

“Or hiding something?”

Rey bites the inside of her cheek to stifle a squeak that she fears will escape her lips. She knows she did not quell all of Finn’s suspicions about her escape from the _Finalizer,_ nor did he mention anything about her staff despite seeing her disembark the AAL without it. Something prickles behind Rey’s eyes as her breaths become smaller, dreading to hear Finn continue.

“What do you mean?” Rose asks.

“I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about it since Kaydel had me help her with some data yesterday, told me some —” Finn stops and restarts his thought. “And the story with Poe, did you see her face? About what Leia said?”

Rey waits for the planet to stop turning and hears the bed shift again instead. She doesn’t know if Rose nods or shakes her head before Finn continues in a hushed tone.

“I promised I would keep this secret, but….” He sighs as he explains. “Don’t look me at like that, I know I know, but I need to tell someone because if I’m right then we could be in trouble — I have a theory and I can’t… I can’t disprove it still.”

Rose sounds uneasy as she tells him to continue. “You can say it, Finn. You know I won’t tell anyone.”

“Okay,” he agrees. “What if I told you what Leia said didn’t sound so crazy to me at all?”

Rey presses her lips together to maintain her focus and tries to calm her racing nerves as she listens to her one true friend betray all that she told him, bearing her contradictions to Rose without realizing she’s there to hear him. Rose asks if everyone in High Command is aware that Rey did not kill Snoke (or if it’s just Leia), but doesn’t interrupt Finn a second time as he fleshes out all that Rose does not know. Rey hears him tell Rose how she can communicate with Kylo through the Force, how they appeared to one another as full-body apparitions, and how she flew to the _Supremacy_ to bring him to the Resistance only to have him ask her to stay by his side instead. He explains he has no idea if anyone else knows, only that he swore to never tell another.

“She said she hasn’t seen him through the Force since he killed Snoke, but…. Coming back with the ship. The decommission codes. She came back from the Forest with her _staff_ and didn’t seem, she didn’t seem surprised by what happened with Namit  & Cicer. She’s told me before she didn’t see him, that he didn’t give her the ship, but — I can't shake this feeling like I’m missing something.”

Hearing Finn voice his concerns aloud is far worse than all the times she imagined them crossing his features. The confirmation that she’s shaken his trust is harrowing like an endless cavern, a vertigoed dizziness that makes it difficult to connect her thoughts. She doesn’t know why she feels so undermined — so betrayed — despite having brought this all on herself. Rey is careful to keep the canteens quiet on her lap as one knee starts to shake, brings her hand up to pinch her nose and silence the sniffing sounds that keep trying to escape.

Rose sounds confused, but not necessarily worried. “But why…. She has no reason to lie to you, Finn, why would she be sneaking off with him after what happened on Crait?”

“I don’t know. Maybe trying to work out some way to save Ben Solo’s soul.” 

Finn huffs towards the end and Rey can picture him rolling his eyes, hears him tapping his fingers on the bedframe.

“Who?” Rose asks.

“You… know that Ren is Leia’s son, right?”

“There’s not a lot of us left. Think everyone knows by now.”

“That was his name before. Ben Solo.”

The room remains silent for just one too many beats as if one or both of them is trying to determine the next step in their conversation. Rose speaks first and her voice is so apprehensive that Rey barely recognizes it.

“Finn…”

“What?”

“His name was Ben?”

“Yeah.”

It’s quiet once more and Rey glances up towards a looming sensation swinging above her head, as if a large weight waits to fall upon her. Rey shuts her eyes tight and Rose breathes out slowly before she speaks,

“I think… I think something happened the night before Rey went to Uyter.”

Rey’s lungs stop, all the air socked from her as she physically slides lower down in her seat, watches her feet stretch further before her. The canteens clank softly but not loud enough to be heard and Rey presses her palm on her chest to slow her pulse, to reign in the rush of shame dragging her below. There’s that strange feeling again, of something turning about inside her and forcing her to stay still despite not wanting to hear any more. Rey knows what Rose will say but holds on to that last hope that maybe she’s wrong.

_Please be wrong._

She imagines Rose being unable to meet Finn’s gaze, looking away to either Rey’s crinkled sheets or the wooden floor. “I woke up and she was… well, she was, uh, she thought I was asleep and it sounded like she was releasing some tension —”

“Rose, I don’t want to hear this.”

“It’s normal for women to do that.”

“Sure, but I don’t need to know Rey’s personal stuff like that —”

“No, you don’t understand, when I looked over it wasn’t… I didn’t mean to see, I was turning over, but it didn’t look right, Finn, she was on her side and it looked like she was being….” Rose pauses here and Rey isn’t sure if it’s to choose her words or make hand motions. “Like she was being pushed forward under her blanket and she was breathing like —” Another beat of silence. “I tried to fall back asleep, but I couldn’t and at the… you know, at the end, that was the name she said.”

“Which one?”

“Ben.”

The tears welling in Rey’s eyes spill down and drop from her chin, the dried thin streaks left behind feel cool on her warm cheeks. Someone moves inside and Finn clears his throat as Rey bends her knees in, considers leaning over to peek through the open door to see Finn’s face. Her chest shudders with the next exhale and another round of tears come down. Rey squints her eyes closed but it doesn’t stop the camp from spinning all around her.

Rose continues. “I… heard her whispering afterwards but couldn’t hear anything.”

“And she was gone the next morning.” Finn states in a serious tone, his words evenly-paced despite the disgust boiling on their edges.

Rose doesn’t point it out or change her voice, keeps speaking as if she didn’t hear the shift in Finn. “I thought it was… she was just thinking about someone from Jakku.”

“That’s fucked up.”

The phrase is short and each syllable twists in Rey’s chest as she hears the revulsion in his voice. The canteens clink again as she brings a hand to her stomach, her body churning as her fears are realized. Every little scene she played out in moments of insecurity (when she told herself there was no way she wouldn’t be figured out eventually) flashes briefly, but none of them prepared her for the haunting restless feeling building within her now when it’s happening for real.

“Maybe she was just _thinking_ about him or —”

“Do you really think that?” Finn snaps.

Rey’s limbs feel heavy but hollow when her form tenses like a readied arrow on a bow’s string. Finn was the keystone keeping everything together, her light that guided her home. She hears him leap to his feet and pace the room, wonders if he brings his hands to his head or if they flee to his pockets, forcing herself to pretend she sees his face — make herself accept the consequences that she always knew were there.

“She lied to my kriffing face, Rose. Poe too.” Finn starts to raise his voice, but manages to bring it back down. “Said she never sensed him at camp. When they were on the shuttle. I can’t believe this I can’t —”

“Look, let’s just — let’s just ask her when she gets back if —”

“If the First Order knows where we are or if she’s fucking Kylo Ren when she thinks you’re asleep?”

“Finn —”

“I don’t even know what to say to her right now, I can’t believe she _lied to me,_ I don’t know if I can even look at her, how can she do this after —”

Rey springs up and all the canteens clatter over the wooden landing before the treehouse, clanging loudly against each other as they roll their separate ways. Rey hops over one that heads to the rope bridge, it lolls off the side through space in the bindings and plops down on the dirt below. Rey hears Rose call her name as she runs, outpacing her easily and sliding at the landing. Rey’s chest is heaving, her eyes & nose are burning, her hands frantically searching for a hold on the railings as she clambers down the spiral stairs. She jumps the final one to land on the dirt with a thwump that echoes in her ear like a snapping band. The main circle of camp is deserted and Rey sprints away, turning back to see a couple treehouse lights come on as Rose shouts her name again from the landing.

“Rey! Come back! Please!”

But she doesn’t, cannot bear the thought of seeing Finn as she returns to the treehouses or the curious glances from those awakened by the noise. Rey wipes her nose with the back of her forearm, her mind and heart reel and spin endlessly — She’s getting sick as she approaches the meeting circle only a few feet from the path that winds away to Kachirho, covers her mouth preemptively as she doubles over the bench closest to the opening in the tree, drops to her knees and bends over the log — She jerks her fingers away in time to hurl emptily on the ground, but nothing comes out. Rey’s tears poke tiny wet spots in the dirt as Finn’s words and his hurt replay again and again

Something grazes down over her spine and Rey bolts up, twirls around to see nothing behind her and another light goes on at camp. Then it breathes behind her ear and Rey spins again, gasping as the detached sensation dissipates. It’s not the bond — the air remains level and no goosebumps erupt from her skin — but it grazes her mind and yanks Rey forward, physically prompting her to take two steps towards the tree. For a moment she considers reaching out to Kylo, but she’s embraced & calmed by a small swift motion and a wind that crawls beneath her flesh.

_Go see._

Rey stares at the pathway towards Kachirho, her nerves and boiling emotions all coming to a sudden halt. Another breeze tumbles over the clearing and the leaves rustle very softly, just enough for Rey to pick up on them underneath the silence surrounding her. Her lips part as the same trembling sensation threads down her neck to trail over her sternum between her breasts, to press her belly and swivel her hips and tell her to continue further.

_You are no longer on Jakku._

There is nothing left for her to stay for here. She has no tether to this place, to these people, to this conflict she’s supposed to be invested in that she knew next to nothing about only a few weeks ago. She no longer has to scavenge for food, defend her loot as well as her honor — and here on Kashyyyk they lay like waiting targets without a leader, without a plan, and without an end in sight —

_When you have the power to shape the entire galaxy around you and bring it to your feet._

Rey doesn’t realize she’s walking until she’s entered the path, leaving the tree with its pile of rocks behind her. She thinks she hears Finn calling for her this time. She returns to her idle curiosity about what would happen if she left them to the Forest, but it seems to come from somewhere outside herself.

_Do you want to keep risking your life for these strangers?_

There’s a dark figure up ahead, a hunched male form shorter than Kylo. She’s not concerned by its presence or by the absence of any legible energy, knowing that she can bend it to her will no matter who or what it may be — Rey is able to recognize What’s-His-Face when he’s only a few feet away, doesn’t concern herself with where he was or why he went off assignment. He smiles sheepishly and removes his hands from his pockets to greet her, one holding a piece of fruit like Connix had in the mess hall —

Rey lunges forward and raises her hand. “You will tell me your name and forget I asked.”

His grip becomes limp and the fruit falls to the ground, his jaw slackening as his eyes relax. Rey crouches down to pick it up without looking away, wipes it off on her pants leg as she stands. She blinks twice and her pulse is getting noisy again as she waits for him to speak. Only a few seconds pass before she tries once more.

“You will tell me your name and forget I asked.”

“Stomeroni Starck.”

Rey brings a hand to her chin, glancing between his pockets and the trail behind his shoulders as she considers her destination.

“You will give me half your credits.”

Starck nods silently, his eyes never leaving Rey’s as he unzips a pocket on his trousers and fulfills her request. Her mouth falls open in disbelief as he yields to her suggestion so willingly, unable to tell her no.

“You will return to camp and not remember you saw me.”

Starck walks past her and shuffles away slowly like a bumbling husk, Rey watches his back for several moments before darting away further up the path. Her steps are fluid and certain, her body strained but freed, and she runs until she feels nothing but her sweat, breath, and flesh tethering her to this place. Starck’s glassy glazed expression flashes through Rey’s mind and the memory of Kylo’s words follow,

_You already know how._

And by the time she reaches Kachirho she doesn’t feel anything at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading and for your support. Every comment, view, kudos, and bookmark is appreciated and keeps me motivated to finish this despite second-guessing myself at every turn. We're about to enter Act III where everything finally snaps and comes to a head -- hope you will enjoy the ride :)
> 
> Big thank you to my betas [elemie89](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elemie89) and [hellyjellybean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hellyjellybean) for being so helpful & insightful (and for entertaining my goofy ideas).
> 
> Posted a [NSFW one-shot](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15479640) from Poe's perspective of what one might see peeping in on Force Bond funny business, if that sort of thing is up your alley. 
> 
> Thank you again for reading. Have been having so much fun meeting so many lovely people in this fandom and everyone here is amazing. Come say hi to me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics).


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A chapter warning for general intensity, however everything is addressed in the tags. Although if you're uncomfortable with pregnancy this may not be the chapter for you. And while the smut contains some elements of mildly dubious consent, it's totally consensual from Rey's perspective. You'll see what I mean.
> 
> Here we go --

Rey walks along Kachirho’s docks, listening to the small waves that rock the sleeping ships and break against their wooden hulls. Almost all the boats are dark, much like most of the shops & homes carved into the towering worshyr trees. The dirt ground is illuminated by streetlights at the top base of every trunk’s opening, creating small halos in front of their entrances. Rey watches her feet and keeps her head down to make her face less visible, concerned she may be spotted despite the streets being mostly barren at this late hour. She hears two wookiees laughing heartily across the plaza; one slaps his knee and mentions going back inside for another round of drinks. Rey pauses and glances up to see the pair duck inside the door, notices several lights on in some open shops as another pedestrian exits from one of the elevated rope bridges at a higher level. 

Rey’s hands hide in her pockets as she crosses the open square, her fingertips dwindling over her credits as a humanoid walks another direction several yards away. She stops before ascending to glance over the stall directory, bounds up to the third floor to purchase a dark hooded cloak and goggles from an empty clothing store. The tired wookiee tending the shop barely looks up at Rey as she slides her credits across the counter. She puts on the goggles immediately, keeps the cloak folded over her bent arm as she hesitates by the stairs’ landing and takes a deep breath before going up to the fourth floor. 

Rey examines the dimly-lit sign and the timetable below it, confirms the mobile clinic is still open before pushing into the glass door. She exhales slowly as a chime dings off to welcome her and Rey tells herself she’s stupid for even going inside. The waiting room has two chairs and a small desk manned by a droid who has one arm extended to the solitary wooden door in the greying white room.

“You can go in right away,” the droid chirps.

Rey goes inside and announces her request to the idle medidroid quickly (if even a little loudly) before losing her nerve. She takes a seat on the examining table and watches her feet dangle above the floor as the medidroid whirrs and stabs her upper arm. There are a few wordless moments as the machine’s internal tumblers makes a spinning noise, everything coming to a halt as it prints a skinny paper sheet from its side. Rey slides the goggles up onto her forehead and blushes as she reads the negative result.

The droid pokes the implant in her other arm with a mechanical finger that reminds her of bone. “The odds are statistically negligible, especially if —”

“Never tell me the odds,” Rey mutters as she stands and exits the room, embarrassed for requesting the test at all despite the relief she feels knowing she doesn’t have to factor… that in.

Her skin feels strange against the smooth edges of the railing as Rey clambers down the stairs, coming to a stop at the landing by the clothing shop to resituate her goggles and put on the cloak. She brings the hood up over her head and nods to the shopkeeper who doesn’t seem to notice her at all before she continues her descent.

Rey walks a few steps out into the plaza and something stills her feet, grinding them to a stall in the dirt as a nudge draws her gaze back to the bar door swinging open. The two wookiees from earlier leave the establishment and walk off into the darkness of the sleeping city. The goggles make the streetlight’s halo glow in sharpened relief and she shifts her weight before deciding to go inside.

She breathes deeply through her nose as her hand hovers over the handle for one more second before pulling the door open and stepping down into the sunken wooden room. Liquor bottles are stored in holes burrowed into the base of the worshyr itself along one of the curved walls, the wookiee bartender drying off a glass as a humanoid man with a crossbow on his back nods and exits the bar behind her. Rey clears her throat and sees that most of the round tables on the floor are empty, save for a handful of female wookiees in one corner, and a male asleep at his seat in the middle. She does not remove her goggles despite the dim lighting and is mindful of her steps as she strides over to the bar in front of the display and takes a seat at the far corner. She skims over the Galactic Basic translations printed on the drink list and points to a random line when the bartender approaches, acknowledging her silent order with a small nod.

Rey looks down at her hands and takes a deep breath to center her racing thoughts and to ask herself where she goes next. All her possessions lay packed & waiting for her at camp — except for her books, whose presence she will have to detect via meditation — or forcibly uncover by poring over each & every Resistance member’s mind. The unusually brazen musing doesn’t faze her, and Rey doesn’t glance up when the wookiee places her drink on a coaster by her hand, just digs into her pocket to drop change into his open paw. 

There’s a loud laugh from a seat a little further down the bar and Rey adjusts the hood of her cloak aside to see a familiar humanoid running his hand through his short-cropped blonde hair while reading something on his holopad. He chuckles heartily again and his finger flicks the screen to turn the page, pointing to one of the bottles in the shelves with an inebriated shout,

“Gonna need a spot of that one too, ol’ sport!”

And Rey recognizes Errol from the tone of his request and the profile of his thin nose. He sits alone without his reptilian companion, who must not be nearby if he has holopad reading keeping him entertained. The bartender mutters something to the businessman as he pockets his payment and slides the brimming drink towards him, shaking his head as he turns his back and walks away.

“Cut — Cutting me off? You’ve gotta be kidding me, who’s ever heard of a wookiee cutting off a —”

He slinks backs when he’s interrupted by a low growling, nodding quickly and taking a sip of his obviously-last serving. Rey looks away and wonders if he’s noticed her despite her disguise. She shifts her weight on her seat and takes a prolonged swig of her drink, clearing her throat with a small cough as she swallows down the burning liquid. She frowns with the shudder that runs through her, certain she’s had alcohol far worse than this on Jakku and yet her body seems sensitive to the flooding taste. She takes another sip with a shrug and eyes Errol magnifying a picture on his page, raises an eyebrow to peer in and see what he’s reading.

_There he is._

Rey sits up straight and glances over her shoulder to see if someone stands behind her. The room remains mostly empty with everyone remaining seated in their prior positions. Rey exhales slowly and turns back, meeting the bartender’s quizzical gaze. She smiles sheepishly beneath her hood and he resumes cleaning a dirtied glass, slipping away to stand on the other side of the bar.

_That’s him, isn’t it?_

Rey bites her lip and freezes in place. This time she hears the words couched in a knowing and hushed tone ...

_If it wasn’t for him you wouldn’t be found._

… the same voice that whispers to her at camp, here making noise in a sleepy bar with her former captor. Rey rests her hands in her lap and waits for the Forest to speak to her again — all the way out here in Kachirho — and keeps her body absolutely still to let it know she’s open to hearing its suggestion. She can use all the help she can get.

_Look at him there, drinking away your reward. Doesn’t even know how much he’s ruined for you._

Rey doesn’t realize she gulps as she nods silently, looking back at the distracted bartender before leaning down to sip her glass without using her hands. She slurps a little loudly and Errol turns to her with a roar of laughter, asks the keep if the fish can stay too. The wookiee ignores him and Errol returns to his reading with shuddering shoulders, grasping his glass to gulp down the final bits of his drink rather quickly.

“Great establishment here, my friend, truly a great place!” He stands from his stool with wobbly feet and briefly loses his balance on an uneven plank in the floor. He grabs the bar with one hand and tucks the holopad under his arm with an chuckle and turns to wink at Rey.

“Maybe the walking carpet has a point, eh?”

She says nothing in return, stares back blankly from behind the shield of her goggles & hood as he staggers away to lumber out the door. Rey licks her mouth and kicks back the last of her drink, clinking the glass back onto the bar just a little too loudly. The barkeep flinches before returning to his chores and Rey covers her teeth with her lips as she watches Errol struggle to find the handle of the exit.

_He gets to walk drunk, happy, and free while you live with the consequences._

Rey turns back to observe the bottles stacked cleanly in the walls like the lines of a calendar. She blinks twice and nods, not quite sure he deserves to receive most of this blame. Sure he took her in for the bounty, but she was the one who decided to —

_Does he even remember your name?_

She peeks over her shoulder and watches Errol stumble through the door.

_Who even knows he’s here?_

Rey tells herself she isn’t concerned with his affairs, it makes little difference to her where Poe’s old teammate and Connix’s old friend goes.

_Isn’t it strange he just so happens to be nearby?_

No, not really, he could be here for a professional reason and Uyter is not far already —

The voice seems to huff with some exasperation the next time Rey feels it speak. _Don’t you want to see if you can do it?_

Rey pushes her glass away and comes to stand, resettles her hood on her head and pauses a moment before nodding to bid herself to continue. She doesn’t know who or what speaks with her but is oddly cavalier about its inexplicable presence. She smiles to herself as she pivots to leave the bar, curious to see where this diversion will lead and accepting its invitation. She follows its unspoken suggestion to leave and crosses the room to exit into the quiet night outside. The door back to the bar shuts closed with a knowing click behind her as Rey crosses her arms, her eyes sweeping over the sparsely populated street.

She still doesn’t know what it meant before.

_Don’t you want to see if you can do it?_

Do what —

_Go see._

Her scavenger’s instinct isn’t sure whether to follow or run, whether to dismiss the murmurs of unaccountable voices or give them a chance to present their destination. The drink lays unevenly in her stomach and she coughs again with closed eyes, losing sight of Errol in the mere seconds it takes for her to steady her body. A touch lingers down her arm to point her way, like when she called for direction in the trees, and she stuffs her hands in her pockets beneath the folds of her cloak to take its lead towards the docks.

It’s not until Rey enters the harbor that she sees Errol puttering along up ahead, weaving about the boardwalk towards an elevated pedestrian walkway over a rocky expanse of water. Rey hurries forward with hushed steps as small wisps of fabric billow behind her, coming to slow when she’s closer to her mark in order to avoid detection. Thus far he has done nothing to earn her suspicion, besides losing his way back to wherever he plans to sleep, and Rey gasps with a breath freezing in her chest when Errol stumbles hard enough to almost topple over the edge onto a jagged landing below. He chortles with uneasy laughter as he reaffirms his grip on the winding wrapped railing before lolling onward and further along the way.

_Just up ahead._

Rey doesn’t remember the last time her body lay this still & silent, her own blood even coming to a hushing halt in her ears as Errol pauses and leans along a sagging unprotected area of the walkway ahead. She does not hear her feet as they stalk closer with precise steps, does not know if he sees her sweeping closer to his spot. He rummages through his pockets momentarily and glances at the holopad before tucking it into his armpit again.

_Show them._

Everything comes to a total standstill. The lullaby of small breaking waves, the yawn of the creaking rope bridges in a faraway plaza, the pattering of booted footsteps on a wooden boardwalk are all silenced in the vacant night — Everything is quiet. Even her pulse in her own ears, despite the queasy tensing feeling it leaves as it pitches up inside her. The sound Errol makes when he clears his throat is the only thing she hears as she takes another step.

_Show them that the galaxy is subject to your will..._

Errol comes to an uneven stance when he rises, trips back and catches himself before falling over. He sighs and the last notes of his breath seem to buzz all around her. His figure is struck in sharp contrast to the dimmed city lights and Rey’s chest hurts as she tries to retake a breath. There he is. This simple creature who thought he could wring her out for his own ends, by delivering her for a prize without any concern. When she is the one with all the power and capability in her body to remind everyone who she is —

_...And you’re not subject to theirs._

Rey sees her hand raise as she walks forward.

_Show them you can do it._

Her fingers sway to the right.

Her lips fall open with a silent command.

Errol loses his balance and topples backwards over the sagging railway, his feet following him up in the air as his head makes a slippery crackling _CRUNCH_ below. His holopad flops onto the walkway and the city’s noises rush back to life in Rey’s ears like a soft dim heartbeat.

Her hand falls to her side and her mouth goes dry —

Rey bounds up onto the walkway, her chest heaving with sinking realization before she peers over to the craggy sharp boulders peeking above the water. Errol’s limbs lay crumpled by his sides, his head tilted over to expose where a jagged edge impaled his skull to bore through, letting the little circle pour its rivulets of blood onto the stone. His eyes change and stall, his mouth softens and gapes, and Rey sees his ankle tremor with a shudder before laying limp and still.

A few moments pass. And while this is not the first time she has seen a dead body, this is one of the few she’s watched so close and so fresh — and the only one brought to silence with just the wave of her hand. She imagines that another time she would have gasped, cried, or even crossed the plaza to flag someone down for help. But instead it’s as if she watches her silhouette willowing on the bridge like a waiting reaper, as if she stands beside herself to see her mouth pressed to a straight line beneath her hood. For Rey this is an affirmation of her potential; and another empty and meaningless death for the galaxy at large, another lifeless husk to turn to dust and become another planet’s bones.

She wonders again if she’s supposed to feel differently, as if something has fundamentally shifted or changed. But all seems exactly the same.

_Looks like another drunk fell off the walkway._

_Should really get that fixed._

Rey bends down and picks up the holopad, sees it’s actively connected to the satellite and considers sending a message. But she doesn’t know who to dial, only knows Finn & Rose’s codes by heart, and realizes she has no one to call to pick her up and take her home. A hollow feeling opens in Rey’s chest, a cavity created from longing and rootlessness, and she scrolls down the saved contacts to see no names or locations that she recognizes besides Connix. Rey swallows and holds the holopad an extra inch away from her face as her loneliness turns over inside her, staring at the lit up screen as she walks to the edge of the railing with her fingertips tapping along the edges of the device. She peers down at Errol’s ragged body one last time as she chucks down the holopad to crack on the rocks beside him, sees the screen split and darken with another crunch.

Rey’s breaths are even and slow despite her racing pulse as she continues walking along the bridge, certain that she sees and senses no one nearby but still concerned by the possibility of being connected to this… to this accident somehow. The bridge connects to another wooden dock that eventually terminates into a dirt path that winds behind some silent houses and back into the woods towards the general direction of camp. Rey glances back over her shoulder to confirm that no one follows, her eyes growing glassy as she realizes she feels little more than an idle confirmation of her own abilities —

And cannot determine why she feels less guilty than she probably should. The trees along the trail from Kachirho back towards camp are not as thick and foreboding as the Black Forest’s worshyrs, but they grow close to one another in heavy copses whose leaves rustle together with every passing breeze. They seem to sing in time with her, gaze into her own reflection, this realization of the true depths of her potential and her temptation to slip from the Light. The stolen credits in her pocket rustle loudly against the fabric as a tear creeps down her cheek, and Rey nods as she tells herself there’s no way she can —

_Now leave._

Despite the extent of her transgression on its behalf, Rey decides to remain resolute. She shakes her head, determined not to leave before collecting her things and somehow convincing Finn to leave despite his disgust with her. She cannot abandon them entirely, not after the Resistance showed her a kindness few others have before. She’s not going yet, marching along just a little too loudly in the dirt to make her decision known, to convince herself that some part of her she recognizes from Jakku still flickers to exist.

_Leave now. Do not return to camp._

At the very least she needs her books, she needs the saber. She cannot go without her only maps to unlocking this strange and still uncharted world.

_Your mate is waiting for you, isn’t he?_

Rey rolls her eyes at the term, ruffling at the change in tactic.

_Waiting to steal you away on his little ship to sail on the stars._

Rey continues to return to camp. She just isn’t accustomed to voices that are not her own. That’s how she got so swept away, so encouraged to act on her idle thought, so… besides herself. She has to prove it to herself, it’s the only explanation she has to hold onto.

_You really do think you own this world, don’t you?_

She didn’t ignore it then, but she will ignore it now. Rey shakes her head and her shoulders stutter as her steps increase in speed, the path seeming so long and circuitous when trying to return to camp. 

_Assume you can wave your hand around and direct it all on your own._

It’s trying to shake her, to use her own insecurities against her to make her… to make her leave Kashyyyk and she isn’t sure why. The thoughts continue to intrude with the same intensity and Rey breaks into a jog, but the speed does nothing to dispel the interloper. Rey repeats to herself that she’s just not accustomed to voices that are not her own, looks up the sky to see the three moons starting to slide past their peak. Kylo will be nearby soon, if he’s not already —

_He hasn’t told you, has he?_

Rey is pretty certain who is being referred to and considers that perhaps she should start paying some attention, but doesn’t have time to ask before her disembodied companion continues,

_You care so much about how you direct your useless body, like its direction is something special that you own. Make it so you can’t leave._

Rey furrows her brows and the endless trees along the trodden dirt seem to huddle in & down towards her. She staggers off the path towards a shiver that grazes beneath her veins, throwing off her goggles and cloak to lay unclaimed by the road when they start to feel itchy on her skin. Rey strays from her known location, does not know what to say to Kylo still, is unsure whether to pack her bag in his ship or escape the moment he falls asleep beside her — but has no intentions of going anywhere without her things. And despite having no way to mark the trunks and despite not paying attention to the stars’ positions in the skies, Rey continues wandering along towards where she thinks Kylo will be found.

At the very least he can… he can offer a suggestion on how to ignore the voice or how to set aside the sight of a corpse crumpled by one’s own hand. It then occurs to her that Kylo has only demonstrated he’s not good at either one of these things. But he does have a ship.

_You’ll leave. You’ll see._

The voice does not seem satisfied by Rey’s insistence she return to the camp nor is it quelled in any way by her dismissals. Its final words drip with a certain air of knowing that sparks an unsettling tingle down her spine, but the atmosphere around her seems to lift and she takes a deep breath to confirm that she’s free — Rey continues jogging towards a moonlit clearing and doesn’t mind her steps, all the wind knocking out of her when she trips on the upturned roots of a decaying log and falls flat on her chest — Her temple clunks on dry heavy bark and her entire head jars with the vibration, a daze rushing through her as the night fades and falls around her.

…

…

The ringing in her ears comes to a fever pitch before everything stops and goes black.

…

…

— — —

…

…

Rey is staring at words on a page, blinks twice to confirm that there is text laying in straight lines in a neat row. There are small handwritten notes nestled neatly in the margins, sketched in by a pen with a very thin point. She chooses not to read them, lays her finger on the paper as a bookmark as she closes it to check the cover of the small book. Small embossed letters indicate it’s a reproduction of _The Rule of Two_ by Darth Bane, and Rey glances back along the marked page to see the word “Sith” used repeatedly. The notes have a detached evaluative tone to their words, trying to piece together theoretical components into symbols to track the logic of the larger work. 

A flutter of movement in her periphery makes Rey look up to see Kylo sitting on the other side of a long seat designed to seat three humanoids — coming to realize that she sits with a couple pillows at her back as she rests against the opposite armrest with her feet on the couch cushions instead of touching the floor. She is in a smaller room made up of vertical wooden slats (like a cabin she concludes), where dried flowers pressed into frames & tied onto strings decorate the wall by an open doorway into another wooden room Rey cannot see into. The place is mostly tidy, but with several items laid aside in odd places. She turns to her right to see flames flickering in a small fireplace, where another book lays title-down on the floor and a covered pot rests on a metal holder. The warmth settles the goosebumps that have flashed up on her arms despite her long sleeves and Rey blinks a few times before returning to meet Kylo’s gaze. He wears a plain white shirt with dark trousers, a set of suspenders laying on the back of the seat.

But it’s as if his face has paused while waiting for her to speak. His mouth falls open for a second and closes quickly as if he’s unsure what to say; a couple beats pass before he forms his words,

“This is where you say that the author worships the Dark to the point of excess,” he states slowly, each syllable being plucked from the spare room. “How you would prefer something a little more realistic.”

Rey narrows her brows and picks up the book again, straightening her posture against the pillows in time with a foreign sensation of fabric resettling somewhere unfamiliar. All the air in the room leaps through the open window as Kylo glances away; a knot tightens in Rey’s chest with the recognition that something feels different —

The color drains from Rey’s cheeks as she lays the book on her lap and rests her hand on her rounded stomach, tries to center herself despite forgetting how to breathe. Some time left to go she thinks (she’s not sure), but far enough along to make it obvious she grows with a child inside her and she wonders what her face looks like as she stares dumbstruck at the folds of fabric draped over her swollen form. Her legs are bare under her loose nightdress and Rey slips her hand down the low rounded collar in front to graze her fingertips along her skin. She bites behind her lip hard enough to draw blood when she touches her belly, the thin coppery taste not detracting from the hollow feeling overtaking every inch within her. Rey’s hand recoils and she rests it on her forehead, watches Kylo in profile as he stares towards the fire and she doesn’t know what to ask besides the obvious.

“Where… where are we?”

He remains motionless, betraying his uncertainty with his downward glances towards the dark carpet on the wooden floor. His voice seems quiet when he responds finally,

“What did you see when our hands touched?”

He doesn’t need to elaborate for Rey to know which time he refers to and she rests her hand on one of her knees. She isn’t sure why he asks, decides to be honest anyway,

“Fighting Snoke’s guard. Throwing you the lightsaber.”

There is a silence as if he expected something more. Rey is the one to press forward, “What did you see?”

Kylo stays turned away, his hand gesturing limply to the wall to emphasize his words.

“I saw this.”

She looks down to the book again, overly aware of where one of its corners sits against her rounded belly as several questions run through her mind. Her heart sinks as words tumble from her lips,

“Then how did you see who my parents are?” Rey raises her eyebrows, hopes to prove to herself that this… this isn’t real somehow. It feels strange to look at Kylo, instead watches his hand as he plucks from the book from her lap and leans forward to lay it on the floor. He sits up with his elbows resting on bent knees, speaking to the fireplace instead of Rey.

“Because you tell me to promise we’ll never abandon him.” There’s a pause. “Like they did to you. When they sold you and left.”

“But how could —”

“It came like a memory. From a time when you confirmed it already.”

Rey is struck by how… sentimental this entire scene is, coded by a nostalgia for something that hasn’t even happened yet.

“This could be — This could be years from now.”

“Yes,” he agrees, looking back from the fire to Rey’s eyes as he leans back and lays an arm on the rest. “Are you really here, little Jedi?”

“Are you?”

He smirks. “You tell me.”

“You haven’t thought of a better name yet?”

“What would you prefer?”

A flush fills the apples of Rey’s cheeks, she imagines the color returning to her face as she shakes her head with a small shudder of laughter. “I’ll have to think about that one.”

The air lies still between them as the corners of her lips tilt downward, the flames crackling softly in the quiet room. The swirl of emotions from running through the forest creep up beneath her skin and her fingertips tremble as they rest on her stomach, shivering with the reminder that despite all her attempts to direct her own course she’s bound to a narrative already determined for her. That no matter where she runs, she will arrive here, sitting and reading books in an unknown world with someone who seems like Ben Solo.

“You’re not happy.”

Rey glances away and her throat moves as she speaks. “You’re not — You’re not scared?”

“Of what?”

“Of having everything decided for you.” He’s silent and she’s not surprised, didn’t anticipate his understanding her quandary. “Of something telling you to be with — Of something making you be with me.”

“No. Why should I be scared?”

She doesn't know how to explain it.

“I’m finally my own and still….” Tears glass over her open eyes, she breathes in deeply. “And still I’m being told where to go. What to do. By others. By voices. By the Force.”

Rey is tired of crying but doesn’t stop the wet streak that trickles down her cheek. She sniffs and wipes it away with the back of her hand, Kylo’s posture stiffens as he watches her lips,

“I just want to make my own path. Have my own body. My own place.”

“I understand.”

He says it as if he really does, but chooses not to elaborate. There is another moment of stillness before she whispers, isn’t even sure if he can hear her,

“Would you stop me, Ben?”

“Stop what?”

Rey doesn’t know if she can bring herself to say it, fears doing so will make what happened outside this place even more real. Her insides drop like an anchor as another set of tears spill over her cheeks and she stirs to bring her palm to her chest — her pulse thrums heavily beneath it. Kylo sweeps to kneel on the floor beside her perch, his back facing the fire as rubs his thumb over her exposed collarbone peeking from the lopsided collar of her nightdress. But she can’t bring herself to look over.

He asks again. “Stop you from what?”

“Stop me from falling to the Dark.”

He looks away to the open door to the adjoining room, shifting where his fingers lay on the edge of the cushions. She realizes he doesn’t want her to see his face when he answers.

“I can’t promise you that.”

Rey nods, but he doesn’t turn back to see it. She isn’t sure why she ever thought he would say otherwise. She sits up to adjust a pillow at her back and tries not to look down when she feels her skin graze the tops of her thighs, unable to relieve the unsettling flutter circuiting through her. Her hand settles on his nearest shoulder and the clutch of fabric feels present, tightening her grip slightly to signal him to turn back to face her. It takes a few more seconds and she does not speak until he meets her gaze,

“How did we get here?”

“I don’t know.”

“How do we leave?”

“I don’t know.”

“What happens now?”

“I don’t know. The memory is shorter than this.”

Rey rubs his shoulder before dropping her hand to the cushion beside her, prompting him to lean forward to cover it with one of his own. She feels his other hand running up her leg and watches his eyes track its movements, coming to rest on her thigh just above her knee with a small squeeze.

“Think about how powerful we would be,” he tells her, but it doesn’t seem to be in response to anything. “Together. With our son. No one would be able to stop us.”

Rey doesn’t say anything, doesn’t tell him that the idle musing already crossed her mind and was summarily dismissed. Kylo presses down on her covered hand with his and draws his lips along her ear, making her shoulder hunch up instinctively to keep him back. She relaxes, keeps her body still when he bites her lobe and the heat of his exhale prickles the crook of her neck.

“You’re perfect,” he mumbles and Rey finds herself staring at the dried flowers on the wall when her breath catches in her throat, his palm creeping further up between her knees.

“Where are you?” Rey asks, a part of her still questioning if he’s truly there with her. She blinks a few times as his fingers tap over the soft skin inside her thighs, the tips brushing the borders of her underwear. He comes up on his knees to bring his face closer to her body, leans in to kiss her forehead before resting his ear on her sternum to hear her heartbeat below.

“I’m here,” he murmurs into her chest.

She lets herself fall open enough for him to push in further, splaying his large hand to part her thighs just a little more when she inches down. Her inhale sounds out of sync when two of his fingers curl around the edges of the fabric between her legs, come to trace the dampened edges of hair bordering her entrance. His head lays still on her chest as it rises & falls with Rey’s breaths, his hand stalls in its place and the heat from his skin feels very near. She wonders if he notices the roundness of her breasts against his cheek, the skip in her pulse when he slides two fingers inside her body and draws them out with a slipping noise. He smiles against her nightdress as he traces his slick digits along the edges of her slit, feels her tunnel & clench around them when they’re pumped in twice again.

“You’re perfect,” he tells her once more with a half-lidded gaze.

Rey’s face burns when he comes in to kiss her lips, withdrawing his hand to knead his fingers over her clit through the fabric of her underwear. She isn’t sure how to return it, her own movements against his mouth are soft and relenting despite the heaviness sinking behind her ribs. She deepens the kiss in time with the pad of his thumb smudging over the gradually swelling nub, directing the damp cloth to graze aside the hood. His touch twists a heat within her, her lips shuddering against his when she tightens up and the small pulse ripples beneath him. He creeps his hand through the sides again to push two fingers inside her, not needing the bond to feel how much she soaks over them despite the detached strange sensation crawling all over her body…. It feels wrong when he changes the position of his hand and his wrist rubs against her belly when he presses hard within her.

“St — Stop that,” she creaks.

He opens his fingers slightly before dragging them along and out. An elastic band snaps back to her skin and his hand comes under her nightdress to wipe her wetness over her stretched navel before dropping it to the floor. The heat from her cheeks slides down and beneath her, the small popping sounds from the fireplace crackling in her ears, the dampened fabric of her underwear feeling heightened & strange against her unfurled core. He leans in to smell her hair and kiss her cheek, coming closer to grind on the edge of the cushion as he does. She swats away the scene he suggests to her as soon as the image flickers into her mind, recoiling at the thought. But she lets him rest his hands on her shoulders then trail down her back when she sits up to hold him close, her heart racing as she feels something flicker & turn over inside her.

“What are you scared of?” His voice is low in her ear.

“Everything.”

She presses her forehead against his neck and closes her eyes, traces the sides of his body with her fingertips. She squeezes them shut harder as if it’ll make everything disappear and surprises herself when it works.

…

…

— — —

...

...

Rey wakes up and breathes heavily, relief rushing through her as she sees Kashyyyk’s moonlight filtering through clumps of leaves hanging above her. The trees’ trunks spin as she squirms her hips, resting her hand on her flat stomach to center herself and bring everything level. The cool night air licks against her skin and she shivers with the recognition that her cunt still feels heady & soaked, clenching up with an unfulfilled yearning pulling inside her. She sits up and stares down at her now-normal body, confirms it’s there before sliding her hand under her shirt to feel the streak of slick still drying on her navel.

She presses downward and checks under the hem of her leggings. The fabric stretches & tents when she hovers her hand only centimeters away from the crotch of her panties before prodding her fingernails against them. They’re twisted and sopping with the proof of her own arousal, heated and messy despite her misgivings, and she slips her own fingers inside herself and gasps against the unusual sensitivity. She’s almost too wet for this to be normal, her leggings dampened in the middle where they rest against her center. She remembers Kylo’s warm breaths against her neck and a pulse throbs through her nerves — as if everything contracts within her, with the ravenous desire to have him inside her.

Rey slowly comes to stand and glances among the endless trees. Her steps feel uneven as she spins around to gauge the direction of Kylo’s energy, desperate to latch onto the smell of his sweat as it tracks between their bodies. She staggers forward towards it, her limbs hollow and needy as she plots his direction like a skilled scavenger should. Rey licks her lips as his presence grows and she takes her steps louder to hope that he can hear them. She doesn't know how long she walks and does not track her direction, follows the tug beneath her ribs that seems to draw him near. The woods are quiet and empty but for the sounds of her own breaths, tumbling lower and hardening in her own ears until she hears him,

_Where are you?_

_I’m here,_ but it doesn’t seem like her own voice.

_Where?_

Rey stops and rests her weight against a tree, her arms to her sides as she presses her back against the textured bark. A dreamlike rush pours through her like a draft, her mind reeling & scattering despite trying to ground herself in something tactile and present. She grinds her shoulder blades against the trunk and the wood snatches and folds her shirt, but it’s disconnected. The sensation is detached and far away, her attention latches on the moonlit beams guiding her line of sight forward over the ground. Tiny patches of new grass bud from the dirt and maze to the west back towards camp, back towards the towering worshyrs that blanket the sky and hide her in their shadows. Her knees bend slightly as she pushes off the tree — the same touch flutters down her arm and directs her to follow —

Rey heeds its suggestion despite knowing it’s not from Kylo and she presses along the indicated path, watching her feet instead of her way as she feels her sheen spread & cool between her thighs with every step. She lets her body lead her to a small clearing where she halts to rest her hand on her chest to feel her heart race, tightening hard when she hears his voice again,

_Stay there,_ he bids her as goosebumps prickle her flesh. His words are deep and full in her ears, curved by a lustful creature instinct that makes her feel empty without him in her. She shakes her head to remind herself to pull back, but instead her fingers brush the moistened spot of her leggings and she rubs it into her herself to make the mess worse. She moans and wiggles over herself in the middle of the empty clearing, drops down to her knees to part her thighs and open them above the ground. She rocks against her hand and imagines him thrusting in to spread his come up against where she ends and telling her to keep it all inside.

_Ben — Please —_

_Stay there, little Jedi._ His words stutter just enough to prove he works to steady his own hardened breaths. _I’ll… I’ll make it all better so soon._

_Where are you? I need you, I —_

“Here.”

Rey looks up from the dirt to see him standing still a few feet away at the edge of the trees, his footsteps slow and full of meaning as he comes towards her. Rey drags her hand from her cunt to slide up over her stomach and then her tits, squeezing one through her shirt as he sweeps in closer. She looks up at his face from the ground as he stands before her and bunches the hair on the back of her head, pulling it down to prompt her to expose her throat. She draws a sharp breath and her fingers wander to his belt, she leans forward to press her cheek against his hips as she does and he yanks her back.

“Rey.”

She blinks twice when she meets his eyes, observing her distantly as she rubs her thighs together beneath him. The dimmed nighttime light swims around her as tears dust over her vision and her body clenches hard enough for it to hurt. She grabs the fabric of his trousers to guide him to his knees, she rests her palms on his chest with a fire in her eyes as another string of wetness slithers to nest along her dampened clothes. She pushes against him and he moves away, clambering to lay on his back under the star-speckled sky. Rey crawls over him and straddles his hips as she removes her shirt, her dusky nipples pointed in the brisk air when she shuffles her breast band down around her waist.

Kylo grabs her ass with one hand and rubs between her thighs with the other, only now she notices he isn’t wearing his gloves (nor his cloak or holster) when he perches his head up to watch her grind against his circling fingers. She unravels the band and settles it along the ground, glances up to see Kylo’s missing items and sack discarded at the clearing’s edge as if he unburdened himself of them shortly before announcing his presence. He creeps up and drops behind the cloth of her leggings to drag aside her panties and feel her slip around his fingers, crowding two of them to dip & dart inside her.

“You’re so fucking wet,” he groans as he bucks his hips beneath her. “Always so wet with how hot you are for me.”

She lets her pulse around his knuckles speak for her, closes her eyes to clench her jaw and picture slowly sinking on him to be swallowed from below. Her legs press together as she bends off him to shimmy from her leggings, slinking her panties down with them as they roll into a slick strip. Kylo stares as he hurries his trousers down beneath her, sits up to pull his tunic over his head and toss it behind him. She’s naked before he is and bounces by the base of his cock to rub its length over her perked open clit. He groans and grabs her hips, grinding them against him as his words waver in his throat,

“Tell me what to do, Rey….”

And it’s everything she’s ever wanted to hear. She’s too greedy to wait when his shirt is removed, shoving his bare chest to lay him back on the ground. Rey pushes up on her knees and loosened wisps of hair fall over her face as she gapes at Kylo beneath her, her mouth falling open as she watches herself slowly wrap down around him and stuff his cock completely inside her. She glances up to see him peeking up to see it too, his pelvis rocking up beneath her as she writhes in around him. He asks her again and this time she answers with a nervous whisper,

“Ruin me, Ben.”

She wriggles as his fingertips glance down the tops of her thighs. She watches him shift his jaw before letting it slack, his tongue darting over his lips as he slides a hand up to knead her clit with the side of his thumb. She sighs and her body wrings him like a coiling spring, resettling her hips to drag along his shaft inside her. He looks up to her eyes and seems a little surprised to hear her say the words.

“The little Jedi liked that?”

Rey reminds herself that she didn’t really, but nods nonetheless, her movements working on behalf of the longing weighing down her core instead of the flickering moments of rationality that tell her to stop instead. She’s unconcerned by how much she soaks over him, dismisses the flutter below her ribs nudging her to move forward, and leans back like a readied arrow. Everything unraveling inside her —

(from the creeping intuition to wait to hear her name outside her treehouse door; to the finality of Errol’s gaze as his eyes shifted to take their last glimpse; to the voice sweeping & swirling through her that seems to lead her to this cliff’s edge to take Kylo’s hand and jump right in)

— Everything unraveling inside her tells her it’s leading her here to tempt things larger than them both. She moans with the awareness of her nub swelling up under his finger and tells him,

“Take me deeper, Ben.”

He gazes down her body as she hitches up and down over his length, groaning at the sight of how he occupies and claims her. “Then get on your knees and fucking take it.”

His lips curl up as if he may show her fangs, grabbing her ass hard enough to make her squirm. Her chest heaves as she pries herself off and crawls on all fours over the ground beside him. He rolls up and over to kneel behind her, dragging his nails down her sides to dig into her hips. Rey glances over her shoulder to see him staring at her entrance and tenses up, a bead of slick leaking to swim down her thighs. A small reminder prickles behind her ears that she chooses to ignore (this is too wet, this is too much to feel without the bond, this is something you should stop right now) — instead she gasps when he leans forward to grab her ankles and lap his tongue along the streak she leaves behind on her leg. Her back arches when he slides it up to taste her soaked entrance, heated & yielding with a need to have him back inside her.

“Kriff, please —”

She shudders when she feels him smirk into her folds, flicking his tongue in once more before pulling back with a wiping smeared sound. He kisses the back of her thigh and spreads her slick on her skin, takes a deep breath from the cool air all around them and holds her hard in place as he pushes into her. Rey’s fingers mash the dirt below them as she rocks back against the rhythm he sets, breathes with every smack of skin from his hips. She moans with how full she feels, everything trembling & flaring inside her when he bends over to press his chest against her back.

He doesn’t warn her and they make that same odd strangled sound as the bond is torn open between them. Rey whimpers with the reverberation of all his skin resting on hers, the feedback so vibrant & present that she questions whether its real. He’s heavy and focused as he presses up into her, running a hand up to rest against her stomach before darting it away. She edges closer to her end and another swell of heady need clamps through her with a rush of wetness between her thighs.

“Feel how ready I am for you,” Rey says in her voice, but the words don’t feel like they’re her own. “How much I need you, I….”

And she wonders briefly if all of this seems just a little _too_ real as she remembers when he first fucked her through their bond, chasing down the glint of treasure twinkling from the sands that now leads her to be buried beneath the desert’s floor. She splays  & shudders with the over-sensitivity of her cunt, the echoed sensation of bearing down around him sears through her, and she feels so small and primed that her gasp whips through him as well. He pulls her hair and whispers in her ear,

“Lay on your back so I can see you.”

He slaps her ass when she crawls forward off him, turns over with her slickened thighs opened wide to watch him rub himself as he stares at the gap between. His face is dark and insistent and he brings his other hand in to push into her with two curled fingers; she bounces and begs against his knuckles as he draws in closer, barely able to hear him when he says,

“I want to see the face you make when I ruin you —”

And Rey is surprised to hear a small whisper swept behind his words as he speaks, his own second thoughts loud enough to leave their traces in her mind when he draws out his fingers — telling himself it’s too soon to be now, that she hanged her flowers on the wall after the war was already over — But she digs her nails in his back and he shudders as he thrusts into her. She rocks her hips back and her stretched walls tighten around him, he gasps with the accompanying ricochet through their bond and presses her knees to her chest to ghost the boundaries of every inch inside her. The bond’s connection is too present to engage the brakes, both their bodies too worked & aware to stop fulfilling the other, and Rey’s moan is so disheveled that her words whine within it,

“Do it, Ben —”

She opens her eyes to see his widen briefly with her words, his cock twitches inside her as he leans in with a grunt crossing his features, his own compass guiding him to the same end as the embers flickering through her veins seem to course through his as well. His palm comes up to rest on her belly and she pushes it out to round artificially beneath his hand, prompting him to rut into her _hard_ with a loud groan.

“Rey, don’t — Don’t do that or I might —”

“Do it,” she insists even though her words don’t sound like her own.

“Rey —”

“Please, Ben, please —”

He pets the curve she’s made and his eyes squeeze shut as something drops and unhooks within him. Rey’s chest heaves as his sentiments run over and through her, reeling every time he glances down to watch his shaft disappear into her aching folds. He looms over her as he leans closer to her lips, opening his eyes to show the unnerving elation dancing over his features as he imagines her shirt rolling up to expose a small line of skin as she leans back and sees how she lets him take hold inside her. Rey shakes beneath him and nods breathlessly, his name softly leaving her lips again. He clutches the corners of her throat, resting his fingers without gripping them in.

“Say it,” he bids her, “Say it for real.”

Rey sits up just enough to change where he ends inside her, bringing her knees in closer to deepen where his head presses against her terminus — smearing beads of pre-come into her as she clenches in and moans. All their thrums and nerves ... their tides of manic desire and careful misgivings … their skin touching and moving and embracing everywhere … their unsaid yielding to the other … All of it builds and heaves inside them to be released, neither one of them doing much to stop it in the first place. They wither and fold in the darkness, both of them clinging to the conviction that they’re playing a game despite it all feeling too creepingly true. Their sounds are loud and heavy, determined yet ethereal, and Rey doesn’t say the words he asks for but they’re exactly what he wants to hear,

“Devour me like the monster you are —”

_Go see._

He nods vigorously like he’s convincing himself, growls against her neck as he clutches in around her throat to choke her and doesn’t let go. The trees blur and spin around her with each second of lost breath and he watches her eyes change as she leaks around him and begs through the bond for release. The night itself seems to sweep down to cradle her in its grasp as she tenses in & up and inches closer with every flutter around his cock fucking her full. The atmosphere’s moisture licks the skin beneath her knees and the sweat along her temple as she slips her hand between them to rub furiously over her clit. He releases her to take a breath and her cunt clenches in time with her gasp, he ruts into her with a promise etched beneath his bones, breathes into her ear and tells her,

“Keep all my come in your tight little pussy so I can push it all the way inside.”

But his other words to himself whisper across the back of her mind, the small voice inside himself that prods him to remember that something isn’t quite right, to stop this right now — _pull out_ — but it does little to convince him to go off-course. He’s too excited by the idea of his seed taking root inside her, too flooded by the increased sharpness  & sensitivity of the sensations shared between them to slow down, too driven by Rey’s noises and rocking hips when she says,

“Don’t stop!”

And she twists and wriggles around him as he grabs her neck one more time, clutches close against her pulse as the woods drop to a deathly silence all around them. All the air falls and settles to the forest floor as the sounds they make tumble magnified into Rey’s ears — their skin slaps and their exhales shudder — his sweat drops onto her collarbone and slips between her breasts — her fingers slide over her clit as she moans and splits beneath him — and she feels his darkness spill over and underneath her as she opens her lips and pleads through their bond, for him to consume her —

_Come inside me and make me yours._

“I will,” he vows as she careens back and coils down to her completion. A hand comes up to press on Rey’s forehead, sleek & shined from perspiration as Kylo wipes his palm against it and penetrates this very last part of her — he cracks beneath the surface of her mind and her tumbling thoughts stop falling in midair, frozen in place by a halt on everything except what they share between them. Her eyes squint shut, she loses the last of the air in her lungs, she tightens around him hard as he reaches behind her defenses and she falls apart as it winds everything just one notch further —

“I’m coming, Ben — I’m coming all spread and strained around your cock, _fuck_ —”

The words are not Rey’s, but she squeals with a moan that shatters deep inside her as her legs wriggle & fingers tremble. The verbal intrusion does not concern her (the sprint to her crest is too overwhelming), and for a second Rey wonders if she’ll ever come this hard again. There’s a rush flaring the borders of her entrance, a squeeze as she jerks up beneath him and she opens her eyes to meet his. This time Kylo sees that her words & voice are not her own, his expression draining with an inkling of fear darting over his features,

“Flood me with your darkness, pour it all inside my ready little cunt —”

“Rey —”

She pulls his hair and arches her back to feel him seal the emptiness between her thighs, to relieve the gnawing ache for his power to claim her, and she relents into the song her body sings and continues to let it lead. She writhes with the first notes of her completion, taut and primal beneath him, and she prods him when the mess of her release starts to soak & rush between their thighs. Her last words drop everything around them despite their low unnatural tone,

“Put your heir inside me, Ben —”

And she shouts _please please_ through their bond to convince him she wants it too, everything coming to a standstill with her need to be taken as his prey. He pales briefly to offer himself one last out — shutting his eyes and gritting his teeth — his entire form is bound by the tension of reaching his end, past the point of no return, and Rey feels him throb and collapse into her as he says,

“You’re mine —”

And all of him seems to release and plug her tight as he comes inside her with a gasp that twists his face. His weight falls on her and within her when she moves up & in to make sure he bottoms out against where she ends, thrusting with his spurts of semen to pool and smear up inside. She cries out and wilts bonelessly around him like a vessel as he stares down to where they join and shudders with a prolonged release, just a few seconds longer enough to rattle his nerves, to leave everything he has to linger through her. She pants with him as everything they feel melds with the other and they grind & ride with it together like wild creatures cloaked in the darkness under the trees. Rey stays wrapped tight around him as he comes down with her knees still pressed to her chest, his hips buckled close to keep her tilted into him as his seed settles to stick & work, to make sure none of it drips out —

_Go see._

A tear falls from the burden of his weight against her, he brings a hand up to her cheek as he lifts off her and she sees his face soften to one tinged by longing & some amount of concern. His uneasy wonderings about whether they’ve gone a bridge too far float to her again as he watches her half-lidded eyes and parted lips. Her chest heaves with the afterglow of her orgasm and she feels so heavy, sensitive, fresh, and ripe beneath him like a smoldering star waiting to be churned to life — They unwind slowly and softly as close to one another as they can possibly be and a familiar voice speaks into her ear,

_Now leave._

And a flicker passes behind her navel and Rey doesn’t know if it’s the lingering static of coming down from whatever has passed between them or something else — but Kylo’s eyes widen as he looks into hers and her cheeks flush when she realizes he felt it too. Their gazes lock only briefly and he presses against her implant to remind them both it’s just a game despite the low vibration of something unspooling & taking form beneath their bond. His fingers ghost over the tight skin of her belly and splay open to push down briefly, her body feeling hot and strange. Both of them tell the other it’s nothing and Rey files it away for later review, pushing him off her as she crawls away to find her clothes.

“Rey, we… we need to leave this place. Now.”

He watches her kneel to pick up her breast band and shake the loose dirt from its wraps before binding it back across her chest.

“Now. We need to leave now, Rey.”

She nods and completes her task, coming to stand mostly bare. She exhales slowly when their eyes meet again and she tells Kylo it’s nothing, he raises his eyebrows and tells her they’re not far from his ship. Rey shakes her head as it pokes through the collar of her shirt, her clothes all seeming to fit.

“I need to get my things, I need to find my books….”

Kylo huffs impatiently as he dresses, watches her cover her form with a sharp gaze.

“We need to _leave_ , you need to —” He watches her straighten her leggings back on and pulls up his trousers. “You need to be somewhere safe,” he concludes and she shakes her head again.

“I’m not leaving without my books.”

“Your _books,_ ” he repeats with a hint of derision as he reclips his belt, “You’re worried about your _books._ ”

And she marches away from him to wind back to the camp, to stand before them and explain that something inside her keeps telling her to leave. To take her elsewhere far away from here. She bounds away from him and his footsteps follow heavily in her wake,

“I’m not — I’m not just leaving you, Rey,” he insists, completely convinced that she’s conceived.

She rolls her eyes and huffs, “I have an implant, Ben, so do you. None of this is real, none of this is —”

“Do you really think that?!” he questions with his hand on her upper arm as if she may leave at any moment. “That that was nothing, that we have nothing to show for what you’ve —”

“For what I’ve — ?!” Rey keeps stomping forward and hopes Kylo stops, even though she knows he follows and knows he always will. She spins about to face him and points towards the general direction of camp,

“If you want me to leave with you then you have to let me get my things!” Rey stamps her foot and shouts, “Just — just stay here and let me….”

His eyes are roving and sad as they watch her steadied hands hold her middle hard & close with an urgency tainted by memory. She feels him touch her cheek and tell her this isn’t what was supposed to happen, he shows how he imagined fucking her softly and coherently instead of hard and wild in a mostly barren field. She rolls her eyes and clenches her fists as she keeps running ahead of him,

“You have to stay here!” she yelps as she tries to separate from him one more time.

“Fine!” he relents as he stops his steps and watches her run ahead. “Just — Just please come back, we need to — We can’t just pretend nothing happened, Rey, what we have —”

“What we have is bigger than the war.” She laughs and it feels deep, full of meaning in her heart and weight in her limbs. “I know, Ben, I know.” She grabs his hands in hers and insists he worries over nothing, that absolutely nothing has transpired. “I’ll be back in a minute.” She squeezes his knuckles. “I promise.”

He repeats, “Fine. Just please —”

“A minute. I promise.”

He nods again and she slips away, surprised to feel the camp so near to their location. Rey jogs to close the distance quickly, remembers her staff leaning against her packed bag and charts the least visible path back to her treehouse to slip back in undetected. A pang in her chest reminds her of her naïveté, that the late hour means Rose & Finn will likely occupy the space, and her heart skips as tries to center her focus on trying to sense the Jedi texts to no avail. For a moment she frees herself from all of it, not caring about the state of her mind or body as she dismisses the lingering consequences of what may have happened, sprinting away from Kylo until her heart hurts and her lungs burn. Her strides slow as she comes in closer to the treehouses, sees the familiar outlines of the entire Resistance gathered around the bonfire in the main circle of camp —

And Ematt shouts to the sky, everyone huddling in close as he screams with a blaster trained to Poe’s temple as he kneels on the ground with his arms raised above his head —

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank yous to [elemie89](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elemie89), [hellyjellybean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hellyjellybean), and [lovefromyourginger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovefromyourginger) for being awesome betas and for their help and feedback along the way.
> 
> Hard to believe this is over 100,000 words with only two chapters left to go. Didn't expect this to get so long nor did I anticipate getting to know so many wonderful and beautiful people through this fandom. Thanks for encouraging me to continue and complete this experiment in being able to write a coherent horror story (with Star Wars characters in this case). Hopefully you're still here after this chapter and hard to believe this is almost done?
> 
> Every comment, kudos, bookmark, and view is so appreciated. :) Find me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics)


	11. Chapter 11

Rey’s heart falls to her knees as she pauses to observe the scene, resting her hand on the bark of the tree she hides behind. Despite her distance from the group their voices ring loudly in her ears, just muffled enough to obscure the meaning of their words. Rey takes several steps forward to stand behind a closer tree, coming in just enough for their sentences to take clear form as she listens. She is confident that it is her own scavenger’s instinct instructing her to hold her position before rushing into the crowd, reminding her to assess the landscape first.

Nearly every Resistance member stands somewhere in the main circle, their posture drawn down or hidden away in various degrees. Leia and Chewie are absent. Rey spots Commander D’Acy a couple feet behind General Ematt, her lips pursed together as she calculates her next move with an uneasily defensive posture. Connix stands closest to Poe, a few feet to his left with her arms crossed and her gaping eyes covered by some bed-messed wisps of hair. The copse of trees that make up their camp seem to stretch taller in the fire’s flickering orange glow, the flames rising high with thick smoke as if several large logs were added at once right before the meeting was called. Some ashes pop and dwindle over the benches, where Namit sits with bacta patches held down with bandages but Cicer does not appear to be present. Kuchimba sits beside him chewing a long piece of grass with his eyes trained to the fire pit itself, shaking the foot that is crossed onto his knee. Koo Millham and Cova Nell huddle close to the men’s right; Millham’s expression sours with trepidation, while Nell’s is disquietingly satisfied with a thin smile. Everyone else’s face ranges somewhere between blank & concerned. Rey’s breath catches in her chest when she sees Finn finally, standing apart with his arm around Rose’s shoulder, trying their best to remain stoic as they follow Poe’s darting eyes. They stand almost exactly opposite Rey, would see her face if they looked through just the right spot of trees between the right pair of mechanics. But neither they or anyone else notices Rey’s return.

Rey glances behind her back towards the dark spaces between the worshyr trees at the border of the Forest. She told Kylo to stay back and does not know how closely he follows, turns to check the path from Kachirho to see that barren as well. She bites the inside of her cheek before a noise startles her attention back to the main circle of camp, her presence remaining unannounced as Poe’s hands visibly tremble above his head. He stares at the dirt as Ematt shoves him with the barrel of his blaster against his temple, Poe shifting off-balance as Ematt shouts again,

“You kriffing traitor!”

Poe’s eyes narrow with frustration, his tone hard and firm despite his unsteady hands. “You’re out of your kriffing mind.” Poe shakes his head. “Leia’s like a mother to me, I would never —”

“You went into her room!” Ematt shoves him again and this time Poe falls over, laying down on his side with his hands pressed on the ground to lean up and watch Ematt looming over with his blaster ready. “Standing there with a pillow above her face and you dare say she was like a _mother_ to you?”

Ematt spits towards the bonfire as people in the larger group shuffle and look away to one another uneasily, the general’s words twisting between Rey’s ribs. The men’s faces shine in the fire, the heat’s close proximity leaving a glaze of sweat on their skin. She is unable to tell who the group seems to believe, everyone remaining mostly still in a hard silence and letting the pair continue on their course. 

“I don’t know who you saw, I don’t _what_ you saw….” Poe sits up slowly, one hand raised as the other wipes his brow. His voice does not waver, appears like the resolute leader that Rey has heard so much about. “But it wasn’t me.”

Some begin to speak in soft tones to one another; a handful of shoulders hunch and become more guarded. Rey wonders if they sort through their own scattered recollections of off-putting experiences when trying to make their assessments, sees Finn’s brows furrow as he looks down to his feet. Rey meanders back to her conversations with Poe and cannot imagine that he would ever — Then pauses when she remembers him gesturing towards the empty space beside her in the woods, and tries to set aside the idle thought of what if he —

“Commander!”

C3PO calls to the group from the bottom of the nearest spiral staircase, bumbling down the last couple steps and waving his arm to flag D’Acy’s attention. She turns slowly to watch the droid approach as if wandering into an average general assembly, signaling him to stay back as he continues to speak,

“Commander D’Acy! You said to come find you right away when she woke up and —”

“Not now,” Ematt growls, dropping his blaster to his side when he turns to face the droid.

D’Acy shakes her head at 3PO as he looks between Ematt and Poe briefly, raising his head to stare back with his standard startled-looking expression. Her exasperation is visible when 3PO continues unfazed,

“General Ematt, we may to be able to speak with her now and it would be beneficial for the group to have a moment to —”

“ _Not now._ ”

Their continued dialogue doesn’t register to Rey, only Ematt’s increasing frustration as she watches Poe scoot back along the ground during the exchange. He scurries a couple feet away from the barrel, taking the break in conversation as an opportunity to put more space between him and his accuser. Poe does not flee the conflict, does not fall back too far when he shifts his weight to start coming to a stand.

But he doesn’t stand. Ematt jerks his head back and the rest of his body turns with him in one fluid motion as his arm straightens forward to point the blaster at Poe and pull the trigger.

“Stay down.”

The blaster shot rings cleanly over the camp and its echo seems to slice the air beneath the dark night sky. The short sound silences in time with an eruption of gasps from the gathered crowd; a mechanic screams and covers her face with her hands. Poe’s lips open wordlessly in utter disbelief as he sees his injured leg, his face twisting in time with his body’s jerky movements. Blood pours from the wound and seeps into the fabric of his uniform to make a rusty patch that keeps expanding, and Poe’s skin is pale from the shock when he clutches the sides of his calf. Rey does not need the Force to read a shift in tone from those in the group, but their tension is palpable along the skin of her neck when she remains in place. She inhales slowly as she watches Rose’s jaw drop, gripping Finn’s arm tightly with both hands as Connix steps forward. Connix raises her hands in front of her hesitantly as she comes closer to Ematt, like approaching an untamed creature that may strike.

“Okay, okay, he’s not going anywhere, just —” Connix glances down at Poe for a second when he tries to stifle a pained grunt, turning back to Ematt to look directly into his eyes as she speaks. “Just… breathe a second, this is _Poe,_ you _know_ him.”

Ematt lunges forward and his lip turns up as he presses the blaster close to Connix’s forehead. Her posture straightens and she raises her hands next to her ears, shuffling back a couple steps with widened eyes.

“Get down!” 

A glare crosses Connix’s features for a second as she drops to her knees on the ground next to Poe, her eyes trained on the blaster’s barrel as she lays her hands flat behind her head. Her mouth opens, but Ematt does not give her a chance to speak.

“And _you,_ Lieutenant, trying to send messages without direct authorization, without a care if they’re intercepted and get us found.”

Rose gasps audibly and covers her mouth, shrinking to Finn’s side as he starts to step forward to escape her grip. She tugs his arm to convince him to stay back and Rey peeks over the waists of every member standing to find no occupied holsters, no blasters or crossbows held prepared just in case. Despite all their regimented training not one individual remembered to grab a weapon before coming down to the circle, even though they were likely wakened from their dreams by her exit or Ematt’s outburst. There’s a drop below Rey’s chest as her breaths become more shallow in time with her growing realization that none of them are armed save for Ematt and despite all their efforts to maintain their guise of order — despite their continued insistence on playing soldiers in the woods —

D’Acy bites her lip before she treads a few steps closer. “Caluan,” she utters lightly, pointing to his blaster when he spins to face her. She turns her hand over to offer her upturned palm as a place to put it down. “Let’s go talk to Leia and come… come back to this later.”

Ematt flinches away and Rey tries to step forward, hoping her sudden entrance will break the tension enough for someone to disarm the general without a large physical altercation — but the bottoms of her feet root to her spot, as if charged by the distant buzzing of woodland animals as the Resistance spirals on without her. She waves her hand and it’s more like an unceremonious flop, balling it into a tight fist by her side when she cannot focus her energy (too distracted between observing everyone’s anxious faces and sensing a small flutter still unraveling between her hips). Rey shakes her head and commands herself to move again, this time stilled by an icy touch on her sternum.

_You’re not supposed to be here._

The voice’s sharpened tone is softened by a distinctly feminine edge, a high-strung note of insistence physically holding Rey at bay. Her hand raises in another attempt to disarm Ematt from afar; Rey swallows hard when she fails again. Something snatches the air from her throat when she parts her bitten lips to shout and the failure jolts her nerves, her mouth hanging open in involuntary silence. She scans the crowd again with the hope that someone will notice her, shifts her perch to look directly at Finn & Rose who both stand deep in thought (as if charting an escape from a maze). Poe winces as he shifts his weight, and Connix squints her eyes shut when Ematt retrains his blaster their direction.

“Silence!”

Rey grits her teeth and lays her palm on her heart to feel the chill still pressed there, refocuses her determination to her ankles in an attempt to will her feet forward instead. Her insides shift inside her, as if her own skin keeps her in place, and the barrier she struggles against (she does not know whether it’s mental or physical) crackles like a whip to shove her back. Rey catches her weight on her wrists when she stumbles back onto her rear on the ground, the heel of her boots sliding out in front of her on her first attempt to stand.

_Let me take them._

Rey decides to speak to the voice directly, as if it’s something outside of herself. _No._

Rey shakes her head to confirm her response, the sudden snap of her neck in both directions making her dizzy even though it shouldn’t. She swallows hard when everything swims just too much to stand, getting on hands & knees to crawl to her previous perch as she hears unintelligible voices from the crowd. She stills in place and taps her fingertips along the dirt, watches Finn’s face harden as she hears the word “location” and wishes she knew what transpired after she left camp. Rey regains her bearings and sees Rose working to maintain her composure, her eyes glazing over with suppressed tears as she watches Connix’s back. A few individuals at the back of the group shuffle into more offensive positions, wider stances with crossed arms, and Rey cannot see Minneau when he speaks but recognizes his raised voice,

“Or maybe we should get the fuck out of here and find a new base.”

Some individuals nod along with the murmurs of agreement stirring throughout the group, Rey notices Namit snap his gaze to his feet as if reminded of something he cannot recall. Ematt remains silent & unmoving when he watches D’Acy sigh with relief (perhaps glad that someone else said it instead), his grip on the blaster slackening slightly as the sound takes his attention away from his aim. Poe inhales sharply as he watches the barrel sag to point to the ground, Connix turns to him to say something but Rey cannot hear her. C3PO crosses behind the firepit to come to Poe’s side, but no one else uses the small break to rush forward and Rey does not see anyone hurry away to grab bacta patches.

She returns to Ematt’s uncanny expression, not unlike the one he wore the night she saw him burning the books, and can understand why they’re hesitant to approach. Her breath catches when Finn slips from Rose’s grip with a gentle push, the woman relenting with a concerned nod as he walks forward to Connix’s side. He raises his hands slowly as he speaks, darting between Ematt’s face and the blaster in his hand when the general turns back,

“General, a lot of people — A lot of us are hearing and seeing things, things that… aren’t real.” Ematt scoffs as Finn nods to remind himself not to waver, visibly exhaling before he continues. “But real enough to….” Finn pauses to pin down his words. “It’s affecting people’s sleep, their mood, their —” He gestures to the blaster. “Maybe it could be affecting people’s judgment too.”

Rey becomes self-conscious of her crawling position, sits up swiftly as she furrows her brow and checks behind her again to see no one approaching the camp. Her cheeks flush with the intensity of the guilt unrolling through her, questioning those early nights when she lay in her treehouse and heard soft moans roll through the open window — when her thoughts were captained by almost anything besides basic rationality reminding her that she turned down Kylo the first time for good reason. And yet she didn’t stop herself from pushing things forward between them, from letting things go out of control so quickly, or from telling him to come inside her despite what could happen. This time the chill that runs through her is the shiver of her own suspicion that perhaps she cannot trust herself entirely either… no matter how much she naively longs for the unique intimacy she shares with Kylo through their bond (or the unique trust & submission of both taking another’s mind and surrendering one’s own).

The shiver trails down her skin like the blood from the small hole neatly bored into Errol’s skull, sliding along the jagged rocks to foggily redden the slowly churning water below. Something drops inside her when she recalls the final tremor of his ankle and the way his glassy eyes stayed half-open as she threw his holopad down to break beside him. The stillness of his body flashes like an intrusive rumination as she tries to weave the camp’s noises into intelligible words in her ears, insisting that she confront the question: if she did that then can she really trust herself at all? She dismisses the contradicting whisper that says she’s been capable of it all along, unsure if she evades her own conscience or something else as she does, and tries to ignore the lingering memory of her fleeting satisfaction with her agency when she observed her handiwork from the bridge.

It could be affecting people’s judgment too. Maybe Finn was thinking about her when he said it, despite his outward reference to Ematt and knowing it’s her own misgivings putting the thought in her mind. Rey’s tongue flicks over her lips when goosebumps raise on her arm, confirms once more that she does not see Kylo nearby and wonders if he knows she was thinking about him at such an inopportune time.

It’s easy to let her thoughts roll her into a daze, and stay back to let the Resistance continue to speak in hushed timid tones as Ematt refuses to drop his weapon. Their admissions of restlessness and flagging morale do little to detract Ematt from his mission and it’s unclear that the camp’s words are even registering in his ears, continuing to maintain his frozen yet aggressive position as Finn nods here & there along with what people say. Rose begins to relax, even fakes a thin smile at some point, and Rey stiffens with the realization that her own dreamlike musings are a distraction from what unfolds before her. She’s unwittingly following a call not to intervene, to stay hidden by this tree and —

Commander D’Acy claps her hand to bring the group to silence and the simple gesture restores some semblance of normalcy to the assembly, even if it isn’t Leia who calls them to attention.

“That being said, we have the coordinates for a few —”

D’Acy’s words decay to silence on her tongue when Ematt steps in time with his blaster’s shot, burning a hole in the ground only inches from Poe’s head.

“ _NO. ONE. IS. LEAVING._ ”

This time Rose screams when Ematt’s weapon discharges and Rey’s stomach drops to the dirt when she watches the woman’s face curdle with shock, fearing the worst when she sees Poe instinctually covering his face. The trees at camp seem to spin and stretch taller above her as her fingers tingle with the memory of the wookiee’s words — the group is brought to a tense silence as the fire crackles like percussion and ejects more ash into the night sky. Several individuals step back to increase their distance as Ematt lunges towards D’Acy directly. His arm straightens to a deathly point as he aims the blaster almost flush against her forehead and she staggers back briefly as her hands raise.

“Caluan —”

“I said. No one is leaving.” He jerks his head to indicate Poe and Connix who remain in their prior positions as they attempt to regain their breaths. “Not when we have a traitor in our midst.”

Rey tries to rush forward and her feet remain rooted, she bends to tug off her boots as if they are literally glued to the ground and are the only things impeding her movement. Her limbs don’t want to cooperate and words are thrown across the main field in snippets & yelps. She glances up to see Koo Millham hide her face in Cova Nell’s shoulder as the latter raises her eyebrows towards a trio of men starting to huddle together. C3PO jerks and buzzes, flopping to lay on the ground beside Poe as he requests assistance in an unfamiliar static-ridden tone. Poe’s eyes widen as 3PO starts to babble in whooping noises and tries to scoot away, gritting his teeth and trailing blood as he does. Finn remains steadfast in his position while Rose fights back nervous tears, and Rey is startled to see small wet droplets plotting the dirt beneath Connix as she bends over crying & staring at the ground. The group breaks into a cacophony of noise instead of being silenced by Ematt’s reignited fervor and Rey slams a fist against the tree beside her when her body refuses her signal to _GO_.

Rey grits her teeth and comes to stand, the tendons and sinews holding her together beginning to follow her lead. She feels silly acknowledging the amount of effort she puts into simply moving her feet, staring down at her dirtied shoes as the noises the Resistance make seem to swarm & swim together like a herd of migrating beasts on Jakku. And in spite of their distance towards her, their suspicions of her, and some of their actions — The Resistance doesn’t deserve this hopelessness bursting to the surface like a series of breaking strings. And they don’t deserve to meet their end like this, finishing the First Order’s work for them by eating each other alive in the woods. Even if she does not stay, she can’t leave them like this.

 _I’m not going to just sit here and watch you do this to them too,_ Rey declares, her anger evident in every beat. She gulps but presses forward. _They’ll get away from here. From you._

_Not if he has anything to say about it._

Ematt’s aim stays true and D’Acy keeps her back straight as she places her hands behind her head, a demonstration of trust for her fellow soldier. Rey is able to focus on the pair’s sounds over the others jostling for her attention, and D’Acy’s tone makes it apparent that she chooses her words carefully when she speaks.

“Let’s go up and talk to Leia, and see what she —”

D’Acy flinches when Ematt cocks the trigger and raises his arm to fire a shot straight into the sky. Everyone goes still, the Forest becoming a silent vacuum as he shouts. 

“NO ONE is leaving…”

His elbow bends as his blaster comes down, he shakes his wrist and the smoking barrel raises to D’Acy’s forehead again. She inhales sharply when the heated metal grazes her a second and leaves a smudged burn on her skin. 

“… Not even you, Commander.”

Ematt readies the blaster with a clack that echoes like a fallen tree.

 _No, I won’t let you do this!_ Rey cries out.

_Fine. Then have them._

Rey leaps so quickly she nearly trips over her own feet, running forward and raising her hand in time with D’Acy lashing out to kick Ematt in the groin and chop his arm to shake his weapon loose. His readied blaster drops from his grip as he shouts & folds over with D’Acy’s nails digging the fabric of his uniform into his skin, and his eyes squeeze shut & knees buckle from Rey’s command. The unanticipated maneuvers from both women startle the group as if they’ve been released from their call to remain inactive and Rey hears their steps stirring like avian creatures taking flight as she watches the active weapon fall to the dirt. She splays her fingers open to resituate her focused energy on the blaster, halting it in midair only centimeters before it fires against the ground.

Rey’s chest heaves with her uneven breaths as Ematt’s words continue to echo in her ears in spite of the camp’s apparent release. They chime with a ringing reverberation as she falls to her knees in time with the general, the both of them losing their footing simultaneously. She spots Poe sitting up in her periphery as he calls her name, and a deep fear wracks her chest like a vice when Ematt crawls and lifts a hand to pluck the floating blaster from its stasis. Rey manages not to topple over when she gasps and snatches the weapon from the air; she bolts up to a kneel and presses her flattened palm forward to push Ematt back to the ground with the Force. He sputters as the air is knocked from his lungs with the impact and Rey hurriedly lays the blaster on the dirt. D’Acy sweeps down and helps Rey roll the stunned man onto his back, Connix leaping to her feet to better observe the scene.

Ematt’s expression softens when he looks up to the stare at the sky riddled by tree branches, the orange glow of the fire making his face shadowed & strange as he looks directly to Rey and smiles. She waves her hand down like sweeping over a curtain and Ematt’s body goes limp, his head rolls back, and his eyes close with dreamless sleep.

Rey’s heart still races as she stands and brushes the dirt from her knees, spinning around to see so many faces trained on her movements after her sudden entrance. She meets Poe’s gaze as he looks up from the ground, his leg still bleeding steadily as his face grows pale and C3PO jerks & shorts in stuttered movements next to him.

The pilot smiles. “The Madam Jedi. Just in time.”

Rey cracks a small sheepish grin as she glances to her feet, not returning Poe’s greeting before joining the larger group. She crosses her arms as she stands next to Rose, who turns to lock eyes with Rey briefly before stepping away to join Finn’s side. Rey covers her lips with her teeth when she presses them together in a line while staring at Rose’s back, leans to the left to watch D’Acy hold two fingers against Ematt’s wrist to check his pulse. Commander D’Acy stands up, a hand behind her back as she glances over the gathered bodies in the main circle of camp and clears her throat.

“We’re leaving. Now. Pack up base. That’s an order.”

Someone whoops with a loud cheer and everyone scatters immediately, D’Acy raises her voice to assign some individuals to particular roles and they nod before running off to perform dutifully. One of the techs kneels next to 3PO and scratches his head, turns the droid over to examine some switches under a panel on his back. Rose and Stomeroni Starck (Rey remembers now) are talking to Poe while Connix sits alone on an overturned log towards the edge of the circle; she rubs her upper arms with her hands as if trying to warm them and nods when she notices Rey looking at her. Footsteps patter down over the circle as individuals ascend the spiral stairs and walk along the creaking rope bridges. Namit has difficulty standing upright without assistance and Rey hears someone slam open the storage door.

She stays standing to the side of the circle watching the Resistance scurry around her and a breeze whispers along her chin to turn her head back to the clearing. Goosebumps raise over her skin again and she knows that Kylo is nearby despite not being able to see him. She idly wonders how much he observed from afar (if anything at all) and for a moment she thinks she sees the fluttering edge of a black cloak duck behind a worshyr tree, even though it’s far enough away to be a mere shadow. Rey raises her eyebrows and glances back to the circle to see everyone mostly occupied, keeps her arms crossed as she starts to step away from the group to take a closer look.

Rey hesitates briefly and looks back to the fire still roaring in its designated place, bringing warmth & light to the Resistance as they flee. She catches Finn’s gaze as he freezes mid-stride by Poe, as if caught trying to follow. She raises her eyebrows and gestures for him to come closer so they can speak alone, but Finn remains still for a couple long seconds instead. He shifts his weight and comes down to his knees to place a hand on Poe’s shoulder, glancing back to Rey with a quick nod before turning his attention back to Poe to ask if he’s okay. She holds her breath momentarily to accept Finn’s dismissal and tries to rationalize it as that he’s letting her go instead — to tend to someone who has just been shot. A reasonable decision to make, Rey concludes, trying to convince herself it’s just that.

She breathes deeply to take in the fresh air, filtered countless times by the near-infinite amount of leaves blanketing the forest floors in shadows. An emptiness coils to spread through her when she remembers her words to Kylo (“I promise”) and she muses on how far along the trail she was when she discarded her disguise from Kachirho. She takes another step forward as an awareness sputters through her, her arms coming down for one of her hands to rest on the patch of skin below her navel before she shudders with the thought and darts it away. She blinks twice and notices how Kashyyyk’s three descending moons cast the patches of grass in an ethereal silver glow, sighs heavily moments before she’s able to discern familiar words behind her.

Rey has taken a few steps forward but still can see the main circle of camp clearly, halts when C3PO’s garbled strained mechanical noises shift & settle into a tongue she can interpret. She doesn’t know if she understands the phrase itself or if her translation is assisted by something outside her, but the noises clarify into two unmistakable words in Rey’s mind,

_Go see._

3PO continues to produce errors per the narration of the tech, but Rey misses the details the moment she sees Cova Nell’s posture unfurl in her periphery. Rey’s eyes immediately follow the women's movements as she kisses Millham’s cheek and raises one finger as a signal (“just a minute”), turning to lock eyes with Rey from across the circle. Time passes slowly enough for Rey to question if something is transpiring between her & Nell, some sort of understanding that they’ve reached by keeping each other’s secrets beneath the trees. But instead Nell winks before she runs away into the worshyrs, and Rey doesn’t even consider any possibility besides sprinting to follow.

Rey goes into the Forest by the clearing instead of by camp, takes a sharp left turn upon entry to cut over towards Nell’s assumed path. Roots roundup and peek out from beneath the dirt near the trunks of the soaring trees; Rey loses her footing on one as soon as she notices, tightening her hands into fists to center her perceptions and sense their positions along the way. She is running through an area of woods where the trees grow a little more closely together, just enough for the thick canopy to envelop the ground in a heavy darkness despite the moons’ illumination. There are far fewer patches of light swimming through spots in the leaves to guide her way, and Rey’s heart races in her ears & pushes her forward as she runs in what she hopes is the right direction.

There’s a tug to cut her off just ahead, whispering to turn _up_ just along here and Rey’s body yields to its suggestion without an opportunity to evaluate it at all. The Forest’s skittering sounds flee from her as she passes through as they did before, obscuring the clomping of boots drumming up ahead. Rey whispers wordlessly and the woods are brought to a silence, all a deadened hollow besides her own hard breaths, and she trains her ears to the distant echoes of footsteps only several yards away. Her legs begin to burn but Rey maintains her pace to close the distance between them, spots one of Nell’s limbs as she darts away behind another tree.

Rey isn’t sure if she’s speeding up or if Nell is slowing down, but when Rey’s body prods her to turn & follow, the woman is only a few feet ahead. Her olive uniform is cast in a twilit gray under the Forest’s darkness, her loose strands of brown hair flush against her neck like spills of black ink, and her arm points to the space before her as if signalling Rey even though she does not turn back to acknowledge her. The pair continue hurtling forward between the trees and Rey’s breaths become more uneven as her focus is splintered by Nell’s visual presence, a sharp pain stitching in her side to impede her progress. 

Nell bounds to a small clearing up ahead, leaps over an overturned log in one graceful movement, and suddenly halts before one of the wider worshyr trunks. Rey jumps over the same log and slows down, holding her side with one hand as she steadies her breathing and watches Nell’s arms come down straight to her sides. Nell walks forward purposefully, each step placed with precision as she goes in closer until her nose must be nearly grazing the bark. She raises her hands to press her palms against the tree and shifts her weight as if looking for specific coordinates.

Rey blinks a few times and reminds herself to approach with some caution, pictures Nell’s curiously easy expression when she first arrived back at camp. She approaches hesitantly, crosses below a beam of moonlight and glances down at her own hands as she does. She flips them twice and looks back up when she hears a chuckle that chimes low like a swinging bell, rolling over the small clearing to fill Rey’s ears. The sound leaves a bitter taste in Rey’s mouth, like syrup coating bits of dirt, and it prompts an nauseous rolling feeling in her stomach as if she’s eaten something bad. Rey steps back into the shadows and furrows her brow, coming closer as her pulse beats rapidly in her ribs. Something tells her to tread carefully despite Nell’s seemingly innocent actions, something that reminds her to ask why Nell will not turn to face her. Rey stretches out to tap the woman’s shoulder when she’s right beside her.

“Cova? Are you —”

Nell turns with a snap, her lips parted open in a vacant expression. Her hands remain unchanged, palms forward as if they still rest on the tree, and her eyes are soft & empty as they stare past Rey’s jaw. Rey brings her hand down before touching Nell’s shoulder, her own voice tiny and timid in her ear as trepidation spills over in her tone,

“Are you okay?”

Nell’s lips curl up to expose her teeth, her eyes widen & shine with a golden glow, and she shoves hard into Rey with her flattened hands to throw her off-balance. It works and Rey stumbles backwards a few steps as Nell’s eyes gleam brighter. A fear burns through her veins as Nell curls her fingers like claws and a flailing emptiness drops through Rey like she’s about to fall from a very high place. Rey focuses on Nell’s flaring nostrils as she regains her composure, stomps one of her feet into the ground to remind herself that she is in control of her own limbs, and raises her own hand forward with a command to sleep as she waves it before Nell’s twisted features. She squeezes her eyes shut and hears Nell spring forward until the entire world stops around them instead.

…

…

Rey opens her eyes when nothing touches her and she remains in the same place, with Nell even frozen in the same position — swiping a gnarled hand forward to scratch at Rey’s face. Nell’s eyelids are closed, shutting out their unnatural illumination, and she’s halted mid-action with a stillness so profound that Rey questions if the woman is breathing. Rey inhales deeply and spins around to see who is in the trees beside her, unable to spot the presence she feels in the spaces between the trunks, which are obscured by a gray-shaded fog. A flickering sensation beats between Rey’s hips and its familiarity makes her uneasy, prompting her to clasp her hands behind her back to avoid bringing them to her stomach. She bites the inside of her cheek and squeezes her eyes shut, hoping that it will work again this time.

It doesn’t.

Rey unwinds her fingers and smooths down the front of her shirt as she tries to track the presence again, but the faint hum of its signature seems to branch & maze underneath and within the ground of the Forest itself. She exhales slowly and decides it’s her turn to determine the next steps, having no qualms about speaking aloud to the empty air all around her.

“What do you want with them?”

Her words hang and waver, dropping down over the fog without instigating any response. Rey glances to both her left & right before repeating herself. 

“What do you want with them? The Resistance?” Rey shifts her weight on her feet, beginning to feel anxious in the heavy silence. “Tell me.”

The answer echoes with a sharpness twisting between her ribs, the same consuming guilt she felt before,

_You should have left and let things run their course._

As if she’s meant to feel bad for it. Rey breaks out into nervous laughter, not sure how else to react. The notes sound false even in her own ears and only work to betray her own winding tension, but she refuses to stop and grounds herself in a recent memory of her own strength. Once again Rey imagines the grateful faces of the Resistance as she lifted the rocks on Crait and relies on this faded picture of her bravery to stir that courage in herself now, even though everything has become so confused and strange since.

“No. I won’t let you hurt them.” Rey is surprised her voice does not tremble and she maintains a steady pace with every word. “They’re good people, they’re honest people that you’re... using for your ends.”

Rey glares into the silent vacuum surrounding her and expects to receive a reply. The Forest stays quiet and she spins once more to find only fog all around her and Nell’s frozen body. Protesting did not spur another response and she considers that maybe offering an alternative would be more useful. Rey takes another slow breath to focus on the voice despite everything rushing and roiling through her,

“You can... you can let them go. Instead turn to the Light to try and —”

_What? Leave this place?_

Rey stops with her mouth still open and shuts it quickly to think of something to say if asked for a next step. She nods along with her response.

“...Yes.”

_I already have everything I need to leave this place._

The answer is brisk and simply stated with a flat confidence that Rey finds off-putting, prompting her to step back away from the words as if they jumped out onto the path in front of her. She raises her eyebrows and one of her hands fidgets as she turns around to direct her question to Cova Nell’s static form.

“Then why are you still here?”

Rey recognizes that the pause that follows is not one of dismissal and a wind withers through the clearing to crinkle the leaves in the canopy like a faraway rain. It rolls the fog in a few inches closer as if the entire Forest took a deep breath while thinking about the answer.

_You’ve never found joy in watching history repeat? In admiring the universe’s patterns?_

Rey closes her eyes as she replays snippets of her visions, remembering the wookiee firing his weapon to the sky with a deadly call for all to remain. She shudders as she envisions it side-by-side with Ematt at the camp and thinks she understands what is being said.

“Not the way you do,” Rey huffs.

She crosses her arms and turns away from Nell, moves towards the nearest space between the trees to try and leave before being halted mid-stride by another call to listen closely.

 _There’s a reason you are drawn to the Dark._ The leaves rustle again. _It’s because it’s always been with you._

Rey sighs as the breeze picks up and runs through her, comes to curl beneath the fibers of her clothing to brush along her skin. It raises a jolt of awareness down her every pore, flexes her nerves with the recognition of her own potential, and flutters her hands with the reminder of what powers lay with a wave of her fingertips. A straining need consumes her, desiring to be recognized and accepted, prodding her to recall every rival she knocked out with her staff and the yielding obedience in Starck’s eyes when he gave her his credits. She sees the ceiling of her treehouse lower & fall into a haze as Kylo tightened his grip around her neck in her bed, pushing her body forward when he clapped his hips against her with every move to fill her. She sees Errol’s limbs shake and fall with his final gasps of air, his head trembling as he picks it up and lays it back down to continue emptying its contents onto the rocks. Even though the real scene had been cast in dim artificial lighting from distant streetlamps, the blood is a shining vibrant red in her mind as if under direct sunlight. She remembers every other body she has laid to rest with her own hands, sweeps her gaze over the corpses crumpled over Snoke’s throne room before looking up to see Kylo step towards her.

The wind fades and the trees are brought back to silence, prompting Rey to open her eyes. She furrows her brow and glares at the closest patch of fog, telling herself that she will not follow, even as the words continue,

_Embrace it. Take what’s already there and direct your own course._

Rey shakes her head despite the curiosity the suggestion brings, grinding the heel of one boot in the dirt to keep herself firmly in place. She can chart her own future with her own hands; she can decide where to take herself to live it out. And she can do it without succumbing to the excesses offered by being able to command the will of others. She can embrace it all on her own terms.

“No. Not like that.” Rey exhales through her nose and the sensation of being watched creeps down her spine. “That’s not me. No matter what you try to say —”

Rey’s breath catches in her throat when a chill of bone-like fingers pet the skin of her belly, grazing across from right to left with a gentle pressure and lifting before circling her back. The trail remains cold for a couple seconds after the touch dissipates and Rey’s hand rushes up beneath her shirt to warm it with her palm. She blinks when her fingers flicker with a recognition, her own signature with his coming to a blur inside her as they take their own single form. And Rey reminds herself that this place keeps playing on her own insecurities and works to trick her now too, dropping her hand and opening her mouth to speak before she’s stilled in her place.

She’s heard the Forest be brought to silence, but never one this profound. As if the entire galaxy pauses at attention.

_Goodnight, Rey._

…

…

The fog lifts and the Forest swells to life with Nell immediately stumbling forward into Rey’s outstretched arms. Rey catches her before she falls and Nell gasps for breath as if she were trapped beneath the ground. She steadies her footing and comes to a stand, meeting Rey’s widened eyes with a hesitant smile and one word,

“Thanks.”

Rey nods and takes her hands away from Nell’s shoulders as if they may burn her skin. She studies the woman’s grateful, even bashful, expression and Rey feels a bead of sweat slick down her temple as she calms. She doesn’t know what to do so she offers Nell a small grin.

“Of course.”

Nell keeps glancing back to the tree over her shoulder as if she left something behind and wrings her hands together as if uncertain she should speak. She swallows hard and stares at her feet, prompting Rey to hold out her palm again to offer,

“Do you… want to walk with me back to camp?”

Nell turns to run her fingertips over the worshyr’s bark one last time before crossing her arms with a nod. She walks up to join Rey’s side and the pair walk towards the camp in silence while they watch their feet instead of the stars or the path ahead. Rey doesn’t ask Nell if she remembers anything about what just happened nor does she offer anything of her own accord, and both women listen to the Forest’s noises scampering away to clear their path as they go.

Rey feels goosebumps raise over her arms beneath her bands, stops briefly to check behind them to see nothing following. Rey messes with one of her hair buns and Kylo makes himself known with his voice sliding down the side of her neck.

_Where are you?_

_I can’t talk right now._

He doesn’t try to hide his exasperation. _Fine._

And she feels his presence dissipate and a flush fills her cheeks, making Rey wonder if Nell noticed when she rushes to catch up.

— — —

It doesn’t take long for them to return and they enter the camp through the Forest’s border a few feet from the main circle. The fire still burns brightly and Rey spots Millham throwing another log onto the blaze; Nell leaves Rey’s side to walk up and gently tug her ponytail in greeting. Millham spins back with a small smile and gestures towards their room saying she’s packed up some of the treehouse already, and they agree to finish together before heading up the nearest spiral stairs.

The main circle still buzzes with activity as individuals criss-cross the lodge’s elevated pathways with boxes, some full of supplies and others emptied. Rey looks towards the storage closet to see it lit with the door propped open as someone goes in & out to stack rations tins into an unsealed crate. Rey wipes her forehead and steps closer to stand a few feet away from a bench where she sees Poe resting with his legs outsretched and his back propped up with a misshapen pillow. His uniform is rolled and torn above his knee, his calf now wrapped in bacta patches and various cords running beneath bandages keeping everything in place. D’Acy stands by the head of the bench speaking to Poe, while Connix sits beside them cross-legged on the ground. Connix nods along and Poe furrows his brow as they concentrate on D’Acy’s words, and Rey has to focus her breaths to pick up on the commander’s hushed tones,

“Yes, that’s what Leia said. That Han sat on her bed and told her he got her message and would be here soon.” Poe says something in response but Rey cannot hear. D’Acy shakes her head. “No, no one said anything. She looked so happy.”

Rey crosses her arms to give her hands somewhere to hide and for a moment she meets Connix’s eyes. Connix shifts her seat and it seems like a silent understanding unfolds between them as they stare into one another, making Rey increasingly uneasy. She looks away towards the tree where they meet for general assembly and walks away from the group with a nod. A shiver runs through her as she leaves once more and Rey rubs her palms against her armwraps as she glances back to camp. Familiar figures dart around the lit up tree houses as the sky starts to lighten with the first signs of morning. She spots C3PO shaking his head as he speaks to the tech, having seemingly recovered.

Rey bites her lip as she sits at the head of the meeting circle, taking a seat on the log with the tree’s large opening looming right behind it. She leans forward on her bent knees and admires the way the stars flicker & dim in the blueing sky as they disappear with the coming dawn. She breathes deeply again and closes her eyes, bringing her racing thoughts to a silence as she traces her steps from the beginning — from when BB8 rolled up to her on Jakku — to piece together all that has happened entirely too quickly, an exercise to help determine where she lays her head to rest from here. She does not have the opportunity to make too much progress and an awareness bids her to open her eyes, one that confirms two figures approach from the camp.

Rey’s cheeks flush again as she looks down to her hands, unable to immediately meet Finn and Rose’s faces as they come to sit beside her on the log. Finn sits on her left and Rose on her right, and Rey continues to weave her fingers together instead of raising her head as she greets them.

“Hi.”

Nobody speaks at first and Rey can read Finn’s hesitance in the shuffle of his boots. Rose clears her throat and Rey looks up to see her nod towards Finn; she swallows before turning her head to watch him speak,

“What’s going on, Rey?” His own hands retreat to his pockets. “Seriously.”

She sighs and looks away to the Forest before making sure she looks straight into Finn’s eyes. There’s no point in hiding it from him anymore.

“You were right.” She pauses. “That I’ve seen Kylo since he killed Snoke. That he gave me the ship.”

She doesn’t address the other thing, hears Rose shuffle beside her but doesn’t look over to see her face. Finn tilts his head and lowers his voice,

“Kaydel figured it out, you know. The ship. Some code he didn’t mask correctly somewhere.” Finn glances over to Rose before he continues. “She asked me if he was your mole and I said I didn’t know.”

Another silence settles amongst the three of them and Rey doesn’t ask why Finn said that, doesn’t ask if anyone wanted to know why she fled the camp not long before Ematt called for an assembly. Rey presses her lips together when Rose rests a hand on her back, turns to see the woman nod again before Finn speaks.

“Why did you lie to me, Rey?”

Each word twists in Rey’s chest much like they did when she sat outside the treehouse door, when she realizes she doesn't have a good answer to the question. What began as a scavenger’s instinct to keep her options open and maps fully marked became an active deception, one that so rapidly overwhelmed her as the inconsistencies became more and more obvious. At least to someone like Finn who already knew so much more. Rey stares at her feet as her vision swims with tears, her shoulders sink and Rose rubs her back to encourage her. The gesture is small but full of meaning, a comfort that Rey does not feel she deserves.

Rey owes it to them to be honest. “I don’t know.” She clears her throat. “I don’t know why I lied about seeing him. And I don’t know why the Force brings us together.” She sighs, feeling like a small child as the next words fall from her lips, “I was afraid of what you would say.”

A tear falls down her cheek and she smudges it away with the cloth of her armbands. Finn remains quiet as if he expects her to continue and Rose’s hand stays in place. Rey isn’t sure why she elaborates, needs to extinguish the thoughts threading through her mind by articulating them aloud,

“I’ve seen his mind and I’ve seen his future, same as he’s seen mine, and it’s something that I can’t forget, even though I know I should.” Rey turns away to Rose, spots the entrance of the trail to Kachirho over her shoulder. She isn’t sure if she should say anything about Kylo asking her to leave, instead offering, “He doesn’t want to be there anymore already. I don’t know what to do.”

Rose bites the inside of her cheek and nobody responds. Rey’s admission lays open for them to peruse, yet neither of them protest or groan or tell her she’s out of her mind. Rose pats her back and comes closer to rest her head on Rey’s shoulder. Finn scoots in to drape his arm around Rey and embrace her from the opposite direction. Rey leans onto Finn & Rose rubs her back again, and Rey is so flabbergasted by their quiet kindness that another set of tears stream from her eyes. How can she possibly deserve this unspoken understanding, this show of support from friends who truly care despite all she has done to mislead them and others? It stirs a flame of hope inside her chest, reigniting something she has not felt in quite some time. Her smile doesn’t leave her face when they let go.

But Finn’s tone is serious when he speaks. “Are you okay? For real this time.”

Rey looks over to the first glimpses of sunlight dancing on the peak of a distant mountain. The worshyrs at the border of the Black Forest remain under thick shadows, reminding Rey that it is time to leave. She breathes deeply and looks Finn in the eye when she replies,

“I don’t know.”

Something draws Rey to turn back to the entrance towards Kachirho, where she sees a tall dark figure adjusting its cloak on its head before pivoting to walk away. Rey’s heart sinks and she wonders if what she saw is betrayed by her face, but Rose doesn’t say anything when Rey tells Kylo,

_Just a little longer. When I’m in my treehouse._

Nothing happens to confirm that he receives her message, but Rey is confident he’s heard it despite his energy leaving the camp. Rose comes to a stand and Rey stays seated as Finn springs up to join her. Rey has trouble reading their posture and reveals the question that still looms large in her mind.

“Will you trust me? Whatever happens?”

Finn and Rose look to each other. Rose nods enthusiastically and says “of course,” but Finn’s eyes dart to the ground in time with his uneasy “yes” as if trying to find a deeper meaning behind what Rey says. Rey knows that at that moment they say these things to reassure her rather than really meaning them, decides to take them at face value anyway and file it all for later review. Rose says something about helping Finn in the mess hall and that her things are mostly packed already, waiting to be picked up later in their treehouse. Rey nods and says she’ll meet back up with them later, waits several seconds before calling out to them as they turn to leave.

“Thank you.”

She offers a wide genuine smile and Rose responds with a small wave as they shrink away back to camp and rejoin the figures walking the bridges and circling the fire. Rey slips her hand under her shirt to rest it on her belly once she’s confident they’re out of sight; a small flare still lingers and it prompts an awareness through her limbs that tenses her nerves and curls her fingers. She waits a moment longer, finds her gaze returning to the empty space where Kylo once stood and knows he expects her to leave with him. She darts her hand away from her skin and taps her fingers along the wooden log, reminds herself of when Finn stood in the circle and told Ematt that they’ve seen & felt things that aren’t real.

Ematt’s snarl as he fired his blaster replays in Rey’s mind and she realizes she accomplished what she set out to do. She dismissed the Forest’s calls to leave and stopped Ematt from spinning out and completing its story. The Resistance decided to flee on their own and she didn’t even need to guide their decision to escape. They managed to leave _relatively_ unscathed, even if many of them are worse for wear. They would live to see this next sunrise and so many that will surely follow. The Resistance’s future would not be snuffed by the machinations of some vengeful spirit in the woods. And neither would Rey’s.

For several brief moments Rey is satisfied by this, feels that same surge of potential that the voice sought to show her through her Darkness. That same knowledge of her agency, that same knowledge of her ability to direct her course. She was able to ignore the suggestions of voices that are not her own. A breeze rustles through the leaves behind her and Rey is drawn to look over her shoulder into the dark artificial opening in the tree. Its mouth lays wide open like an invitation and the wind calms down without any whispers rolling in its wake.

Rey licks her lips and isn’t sure what it is that brings her to stand and draw in closer, grazing her fingertips along the borders of the opening and sticking her head inside. She blinks twice and confirms that no one is watching her when she ducks down to enter and stand inside the tree’s hollowed trunk. She clasps her hands behind her back and stares down at the small pile of rocks in the center, hears the distant shout of someone back at the camp but cannot discern what they are saying.

Rey kneels on the ground, picks up the stone at the very top of the stack to see that all below it are nearly uniform in size & shape, they’re all little rounded ovals like flattened eggs. There are more towards the bottom that taper up in thinner layers towards the top, set up in a makeshift pyramid or cone rather than a random assortment. Rey sets the stone down and starts to pluck the others off one by one, the shape becoming wider and more deformed until there’s a single layer left in a lopsided square. That tension twists inside her once more and insists she look down just one step lower, but Rey doesn’t have any idea what she can expect to find.

She gets on her hands and knees and digs out the last bit of rocks with a scooped palm, they fall and scatter all over the ground with a flat plucking sound. Rey rests her fingers on the exposed dirt to find it soft and aerated, easily pushed aside as she sweeps her hands over it to expose whatever rests beneath. Her breaths stay even as she moves aside more inches of soil that she drops into another pile beside her without asking why she’s still looking.

She scoops her hand in once more and her fingertips graze the edges of something rounded & stippled, hardened & set — Rey gasps as she sees herself petting the revealed edges of calcified bones and shuts her eyes as a pained plea wracks through her —

_The wookiee boy’s face contorts with his final cries, his paws reaching out to grasp the bolt wedged into his chest as tears stream down his fur. His shouts fill the air and the Forest’s leaves are alight with noise & flight as he drops to his knees. He stares back into his father’s hardened gaze and his eyelids droop down to guide his end before he can ever find out why this all happened._

Rey peels her eyes open and wipes away the sweat beading down her forehead. She leaps to her feet and runs back to camp, her heart hammering hard as she bounds up the nearest set of spiral stairs to be off the ground and heading towards her treehouse, to find the last of her things before finally leaving this kriffing place.

She considers what she will need to say to Kylo when he appears. But she has a few more minutes to run through it all before he inevitably shows up in her room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU to everyone who has read this and THANK YOU for your support & encouragement. Every comment, kudos, bookmark, and view is so appreciated and has kept me motivated at every turn. A big thank you to my betas [elemie89](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elemie89) and [hellyjellybean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hellyjellybean) for looking at this with very short notice and for being so amazing along the way. Thank you to all the awesome reylos I have met and thank you for welcoming me into this crazy fun fandom.
> 
> Wow I can't believe we've actually made it to the last chapter. I can't believe I've actually written all this. I hope you are as excited as I am to see this spooky tale reach its conclusion -- and think it will be an ending you'll remember :)
> 
> Here's to a big finish in time to share for Halloween! Come say hi and follow me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics).


	12. Chapter 12

Rey stops halfway up the spiraling stairs when she hears a familiar chirping below, looks down at Poe laying on the nearby bench and shuffling his hand in his intact uniform pocket. She can only see the top of his head as he takes out his comlink and examines the device, but he nods excitedly and raises a hand when he calls out across the circle.

“My comlink is up,” he announces and nearly everyone in attendance checks their own with murmurs of surprise, even some excitement.

Rey licks her lips when she considers her own empty pockets, reaffirms her grip on the railing, and continues up the stairs. She hears Riva Rosetta gasp with joy when she tells someone she was able to send a message to her sister successfully. Rey halts again at the top of the landing when she briefly asks herself whether her recent actions have any connection to the communications’ near-miraculous recovery and realizes how silly the thought seems as it floats in & passes through. Below in the main circle D’Acy stands by Poe with his device in her hand and reiterates back something he must have been saying before, losing some snippets of words when individuals bustle behind her crossing the bridges.

“... So Dameron if you’re saying Wexley & Pava already worked something out with someone out there then …” “... A sympathetic patron, but only temporary …” “... I can vouch for the base on Hoth, but the weather is better on Naboo …” “... We can regroup and scope the other bases from Theed …”

It makes Rey smile to hear Poe speak with a charged & confident voice, in his element as he and D’Acy plan and strategize the Resistance’s next steps. And there’s a unity of purpose in everyone’s gait and composure as they pack their things all around camp, waiting to be directed to a hopeful unknown. Rey’s fingers linger along the twisted ropes as she spans the bridge, occasionally glancing over to the worshyrs nearby to confirm that they remain standing still. She repeats the name of the place to herself again ( _Naboo_ ), having seen it on a holovid before, and wonders how many suns it will have and whether there are oceans along with its cities.

The idle amusement extinguishes quickly as she draws closer to her treehouse, glancing into the other rooms she passes through their open doors & windows. Her chest sinks as each lodging is more barren than the last, with nearly everyone at camp almost completely packed. The odds are slim that her books would be left waiting for retrieval at this point, dismisses the curdling thought of the Jedi texts stacked on a lonely stump in the dark woods. Her brows furrow as she tries to rush through alternatives, to construct a method for locating her missing things — and to think of anything else beside her pending reunion with Kylo and all the things she isn’t sure she wants to say. Nell & Millham kneel on the floor and a pack zips as Rey glances to their window, her arms crossed as she nods at the pair despite their not noticing her presence. She keeps her hands close to her chest as she pauses before the entrance to her room to see neither Rose or Finn inside. 

The wooden walls and ceiling are partially shadowed as the suns ascend the sky, the treehouse quiet & empty as if frozen to a frame. Both the beds are stripped of their sheets and only the yellowing semi-flattened mattresses remain. Rey’s packed bag and staff rest at the foot of her bed untouched while Rose’s pack lays waiting on the wall by hers. Rey exhales slowly before crossing the threshold and turns to close the open door, keeping her hand still for a moment before sliding the manual lock in place. She walks the small space to sit on the edge of her bed with her feet on the floor, the first night she slept here feeling like a lifetime ago. She had stretched her legs and told Rose the room smelled better than the _Falcon_ ’s recycled air and they smiled in agreement before drifting off to sleep. Rey’s gaze wanders to the window, remembers the sounds that tumbled through and invited her to find what lays hidden here — and blinks when she’s struck by the thought to check under her floorboard one more time. Just in case.

She kneels beside her bed and leans in to yank the board up when it’s trickier to unwedge than usual. Rey huffs and there’s crinkle of splintering wood when it releases from the floor, her eyes widening as she stares down at the Jedi texts laying there innocently.

Rey snaps up to sit back on her heels and her body feels hollow and strange. The texts’ absence had utterly convinced her she had been betrayed in those moments when she cried herself to sleep before Finn knocked on the door to wake Rose (her separation and distance being confirmed by the overheard conversation only how long later) — all confusing and diffusing her emotions into a heated swirl telling her to leave — which she did, for better or for worse in all that followed. She glances back to the window and confirms that it is still empty, bends back in to run her fingers over the top book’s cover. The leather is ice cold against her skin. Her hand recoils with the shock of the unexpected sensation and she pets it again to confirm it remains. She pushes the top text aside and all her books are accounted for, all feeling frozen like bits of ice in her little cubby under the floor. She isn’t sure why she remembers when Kylo found his lightsaber similarly, her pulse suddenly speeding to a wild beat when goosebumps raise over her upper arms.

Rey places her hand over her heart, but the gesture does nothing to steady it. She keeps her eyes down towards the books and doesn’t turn to greet who she knows stands behind her.

“You find them?”

Kylo’s voice falls heavily in the room and Rey bites the inside of her cheek for an extra second of silence before responding, assuming he refers to the books.

“Yes. I did.”

She rests her fingertips on the edge of her mattress and closes her eyes when he speaks to her back,

“I saw you with the — With your friends before.” Rey muses that this correction would prompt a grin from her in other circumstances, but Kylo’s tone is so serious when he continues that it’s quickly cast aside. “You didn’t look like you want to leave.”

She clenches her teeth and rises to sit back on the bed, staring down at her hands in her lap instead of up to Kylo’s face. She sees the toes of his boots in her periphery, one coming to point inward as her silence grows longer, and he speaks again to ask her to say what he expects to hear.

“Just say that you’re not leaving, Rey.”

She looks at his lips instead of his eyes when she responds. “I can’t. Not right now.”

Rey presses her own lips together and meets his gaze. He shifts his jaw and she’s not sure if he glances away at her stomach or her wringing hands, but he makes a half-hearted attempt to harden his expression and doesn’t quite set his features into a glare. His brows are creased with frustration above concerned eyes and he looks away as if staring through the window he cannot see.

“You expect me to leave and just not know.”

Rey watches his profile as he swallows and glances to the floor, keeping his hands hidden in his cloak without any elaboration. She rests her palms on her knees and wonders if she sits on a log where he is, or if she sits bent in mid-air. Her chest tightens with the weight of his statement and she shifts on the mattress uncomfortably as she tries to put her contradicting emotions into words.

“You haven’t been here to — You haven’t seen all the things that have happened here, what this place can make you think and —” She pauses when Kylo turns back to her, his eyes sharpened by a curiosity tempered with suspicion. “What it can make you think is real even when it’s not.”

Kylo doesn’t react, at least not in any way that she expects when his expression remains mostly unchanged. There are several seconds of silence when he chooses his reply carefully, as if laying it gently across the floor,

“You think none of this is real.” Another beat. “None of it at all.”

Rey did not anticipate her eyes welling with tears at this moment, did not predict the sickening crunch she feels when he gives words to her misgivings. She is unable to quell the insistent whisper of her conscience suggesting that the sense of belonging with him is a product of her environment, of something else besides the rush of rightness she feels close to him with the flicker of their bond between them. She asks herself if it’s the same thing stoking the flicker that remains below her navel, the one she can’t ignore when her thoughts wander back to it. She won’t know for sure what’s real and what’s not until she’s gone. And her scavenger’s instinct tells her not to flee a more certain thing with the Resistance until she does.

She can’t risk it. Not when she’s finally on her own, finally not on Jakku. And not for someone of questionable stability and a proven proclivity for darkness, no matter what the Force or her heart has to say about it.

“That’s not it,” she admits. “I just need to figure out which parts.”

“The thought of being with me is just that dreadful?”

Rey blinks, her face paling when she hears the vulnerability wavering his sharp tone. Her fingers tense against her knees when her silence spurs Kylo to continue,

“You’ll do everything else with me but stand by my side. Even dismiss the Force itself.”

His hand moves beneath his cloak, but Rey doesn’t see where it goes. She isn’t sure whether to be stunned or stung by his words, finding herself unable to speak as her thoughts churn in so many directions and catch everything in her throat.

 _It’s not that, Ben,_ she tells him instead, her gaze returning to his feet. _I can’t just leave and not know either._

He exhales through his nose and takes a couple steps closer, perhaps finding it easier this way too. _Would you even tell me?_

Rey knows what he means despite the change in topic. She bites the inside of her cheek, but does not hesitate in her response despite the crawling sensation it prompts beneath her skin. _Yes. It’s not like I can get rid of you anyways._

She glances up with an uneasy smile but Kylo does not return it. They both know they have some degree of control over the bond; it’d be easy enough to shut the other out when it opens. She could decide to do away with any proof of their intimacy and he would never know.

Rey clears her throat. “I would tell you. I mean it.”

“Of course,” he sputters as if she’s made an empty promise.

She opens her mouth to speak again and thinks better of it when he turns his back to her with a huff. A wave of deep disappointment surges her veins and weighs her down; he takes a few steps to the left and his elbow bends as he grabs something beneath his cloak. She expects him to shout, but he doesn’t, instead igniting his saber to slash at what she assumes is a tree beside him and hurriedly closing the connection between them.

Rey bites her bottom lip and the shuffling sounds outside turn back up to normal volume. The air lifts and she settles her gaze on the brush of blue sky through her window, not realizing she rests her hand on her stomach again until she tenses and takes it away.

— — —

The Resistance packs up base quickly & efficiently, making use of the AAL for delicate cargo and the transportation of members being kept under close medical supervision: Poe, Cicer, Namit, and a groggy Ematt (to whom D’Acy fed laced water to keep sedate until his wellness can be confirmed). Rey crosses the rope bridges to attend their final assembly before departure and looks down at the main circle when she hears Poe groaning about the arrangement to D’Acy (“leaving me with no one to talk to besides droids & the medic” “Starck is piloting, you can bother him if you’re feeling desperate Dameron”). Rey spots a couple people making final checks in the treehouses. A few individuals shout confirmations to D’Acy that various items have been stored away in the _Falcon_ as they return to camp and gather around the firepit, whose flames have reduced to mostly embers  & coals. Rey pauses when she sees D’Acy jerk up suddenly,

“Connix!” she calls, raising a hand to signal the lieutenant in the direction of the bridge Rey stands on.

“We got it!” Connix calls back and Rey turns to hold onto the opposite side’s railings, the one closer to the worshyr trees, to see her below.

Connix & Nell stand with a wookiee near the Forest’s edge, just close enough for Rey to make out most of the words with no one crossing the bridge behind her. Connix frames herself with straightened shoulders while Nell watches a bundle the wookiee holds with her arms crossed. The wookiee carries a blaster in his holster and wears a shoulder sling with a built-in comlink… it occurs to Rey he may be some sort of officer from the city although nothing she definitively recognizes. Connix nods as Nell translates the shryiiwook aloud, pointing to the fabric he holds,

“He’s asking if those belong to anyone here,” Nell explains, and she sidesteps just enough for Rey to see her discarded cloak and goggles in the wookiee’s paws. He raises a paw out to his side to indicate a line in the air and Nell points to it. “Thin bipedal female. Would be about that tall.”

Rey inhales deeply through her nose as she concentrates on keeping her expression unchanged, sets aside the question of whether any of them can see her from here. Yet she is oddly calm instead of anxious as Nell translates the wookiee accurately, even when she catches Connix’s statement to Nell afterwards,

“Think someone has a cloak pretty similar to that, but can’t think of who.”

The wookiee reveals interest in these words, tilting his head to the side when he asks for some more elaboration without explaining why. Nell shakes her head and tells Connix she’s thinking of a name that Rey does not recognize, a name that Rey assumes lost its carrier somewhere between D’Qar and Crait. The wookiee growls again, asking if they’re sure the items don’t belong to anyone at camp and Nell nods without providing translation,

“Yes. Sure. Thank you, we’re on our way just now.”

Connix doesn’t question Nell’s response and offers a small wave before pivoting to return to camp; Nell mirrors her actions a few seconds later. Connix glances up to Rey as she passes under the bridge, but the lieutenant doesn’t seem to think anything of her presence. Nell stops when she reaches the closest point below Rey, looks up with her arms still crossed and winks before continuing on her course. Rey holds her breath and turns to the bridge’s other side, failing to find any Force signature with the woman below as she scratches the back of her neck nervously. The wookiee lumbers across the clearing towards the path to Kachirho with Rey’s cloak & goggles swinging from his paw as he leaves. In the distance Rey sees him pause to look at the tree by the meeting circle, offering its hollowed entrance a slow somber nod before disappearing down the trail.

Rey runs her fingertips along the bridge’s ropes a final time as she walks to the landing, admiring the way the early morning suns glimmer over the tops of Kashyyyk’s endless trees and distant peaks. Rey inhales deeply and for these last few moments on her way down to the main circle of camp she can recall the humble beauty she saw in this place’s forests when she arrived — cool air, breezy nights, and fresh landscapes so different from everything on Jakku. Yet her hand stutters along the railing as she shuffles down the stairs with urgent steps, not wanting to keep the worshyrs behind her back for too long. The fleeting worry is relieved when Rey joins the Resistance in the circle, coming to stand next to Rose at the front of the group. The women’s eyes meet briefly and Rose offers a small grin, nodding to D’Acy standing in front by the firepit as the last stragglers arrive. Rey crosses her arms and relaxes her shoulders, relieved to see the Forest remains unchanged behind the commander’s shoulders (as if the trees might leap or bite). There is no wave of a black cloak fleeing behind a trunk and Rey wonders if Kylo headed directly for his ship or remains nearby, the musing derailed when D’Acy claps her hands and clears her throat.

“Everyone has their assignments and shift schedules, we’re going to be in transit here for a little bit, but we have temporary lodging secured on the other side while we seek a new base. We may be small in numbers, but the hope we bring to the galaxy will burn bigger and brighter with our renewed strength of purpose...”

D’Acy’s eyes scan the crowd, but this time she doesn’t complete her silent headcount with an air of sadness and instead with a wide smile. Rey glances around to see everyone’s tired & drawn faces, and while all look exhausted from staying up through the night to pack, their posture is casual & comfortable as if a weight has been lifted from all their shoulders. They still believe in a promise of a hopeful future, recall their spirited determination to set the galaxy back on its correct course — and while their excitement is contagious, it still feels like it’s set a length apart. For a second Rey can feel her tattered blanket tangled around her ankles and filled with sand as she stared at the ceiling of her AT-AT dreaming of a life & home she made on her own. A home that maybe she can find here with the Resistance, these strangers who lay down their lives for one another for a greater good they seek. Or maybe somewhere quiet, where she can regain that solitude she grew with & grew into as she scaled the Empire’s desert ruins — somewhere with no assignments, orders, or close quarters. She supposes she’ll know soon enough.

Rey whispers her affirmation below her breath as D’Acy continues, reminds herself that she is the only one who decides where she goes now, _You are no longer on Jakku._

“...The Resistance lives to see another morning, and will for many more. Because we’re something bigger than bodies and weapons and ships and we aren’t going to let some kriffing trees say otherwise.” D’Acy grins. “Right? We leave this place behind us. We carry nothing with us from this place but our resilience and —”

D’Acy stops to turn when she notices people looking towards the spiral stairs behind her, where Leia descends with C3PO shuffling down right in front of her. He flanks the general’s side when she reaches the ground, walking unusually close to her as if concerned she may fall over. Leia’s features brighten as she faces everyone and comes to D’Acy’s side, walking a few steps closer to the group so that she’s only a couple feet from Rey and Rose. Her presence commands everyone’s attention when she echoes D’Acy’s words,

“Commander D’Acy is right. The Resistance will continue to restore hope for the galaxy, today and for many days to come.” (A few people nod and someone shouts “hear hear!” to which Leia tilts her head with a mischievous grin.) “Wouldn’t celebrate yet soldier, we have to get to Naboo first. So let’s go.”

Leia adjourns the assembly with a clap of her hands and the group breaks apart around Rey, scattering to grab their personal packs from the ground before heading out into the woods towards the ships. It occurs to Rey that this is the first time she’s seen Leia since she promised she would bring Kylo home. Rey studies Leia’s expressions and posture as she speaks with D’Acy, searching for a certain aimlessness in the woman’s eyes that she is unable to detect. Despite everyone speaking of Leia as if she’s become frail & feeble from the vacuum of space, Rey only sees the robust & resolute general before her — the one who told Rey they already have everything they need to persevere. She wonders what changed Leia’s mind about leaving despite feeling her son nearby... and Rey briefly imagines Chewie, Poe, and D’Acy in Leia’s treehouse speaking in hushed tones with 3PO chiming in occasionally, the woman’s hands in her lap as she stares out her open window with a silent nod.

— The scene is disrupted by a widening ripple, like a stone dropped in water, and Rey looks up from her feet to see Leia walking up to her in time with a small brush over her mind. The sensation sticks like a thin coat of drying paint and Rey hurries to hide everything back below her blank white screen, focuses on keeping her mind empty and not shrinking from Leia’s gaze. She places her hand on Rey’s shoulder with a small squeeze, leaving it there as a few wordless seconds pass between them. Rey isn’t sure who hesitates first, but the borders of her defense begin to fray & peel back just a bit —

Leia drops her hand and nods with the faintest smile across her lips before she turns to leave. And even though nothing was said between them, Rey is not entirely sure she remembers how to breathe when she watches Leia’s back as she walks away.

— — —

Rey stares at the low ceiling of the top bunk above her as she lays down for her assigned sleeping shift on the _Falcon_. The room is cold and still with the sounds of filtered air and Rose’s soft breaths, the dimmed lights casting everything in a washed out gray. Rey brings the blanket up below her chin and closes her eyes another time, trying to sleep despite the nagging thought that things ended too easily — wondering why whatever spoke to her on Kashyyyk was not terribly concerned about the Resistance and far more invested in keeping her away when things spiraled to their terminal peak. She counters this with the consideration that it wanted her gone because she would insist on intervening, but somehow that doesn’t seem right.

It had just let her go save them after all.

...

...

Rey is back on the crashing ship when she opens her eyes, her wrists and ankles shackled to the ground like before. A rush of wind creases Rey’s clothes and whips loose strands of hair across her face. She spits some out of her mouth when she turns to her right to see Kylo absent this time. She stares down at her wiggling feet, trying to free her limbs again to no avail. Her stomach flips with the same teetering sensation of an uncontrolled descent, the vessel careening towards Kashyyyk’s atmosphere like it did centuries ago. The smell of smoke makes her nauseous and stings her eyes, squeezing them tightly closed as she coughs and jerks her head towards her left side. A vibrating boom shatters across the floor and it shakes Rey’s body with a blinding heat as flames lick up the fabric of her trousers. She takes a hard breath of smoke to scream and it stifles her lungs & tears her nerves, racking her chest again until it surges in intensity to break with a sudden silence —

— the pain dissipating into a total stillness of her body. Her eyes peel open when she exhales heavily, expelling the final bits of smoke from her lungs when she sees the same humanoid woman unchained and kneeling with her vacant eyes inches from Rey’s cheek. Her wan face’s features appear hollow in the uneven shadows of shrapnel frozen in midair, the cracked skin around her lips stretching when she just says,

“Rey.”

Rey recognizes her voice, the pained softened edge in the tone that drove her back and told her she was not supposed to be present, and the woman’s skeletal hands come to rest on Rey’s shoulders with a chill that penetrates her skin. Rey gasps but no sound comes from her throat, her pulse racing when she feels the beat of the woman’s Dark signature and recalls Kylo’s theory:

_Perhaps a Force sensitive prisoner couldn’t find a way through._

(And Rey wants to ask why, her mouth uselessly trying to form the word despite her voice being muted — why drive the lodge’s caretaker to slaughter his family & guests and why try to prompt the Resistance to repeat the same course; why whisper in Rey’s window and nudge her thoughts and tell her to act on her temptations —)

But the way the woman grins makes Rey think she wouldn’t answer even if she could ask, squeezing Rey’s shoulders with the same touch of tenderness as Leia did only several hours earlier. Rey blinks as a thumb drags an icy trail down her collarbone, her heart beating so rapidly that it may burst. Rey’s chest heaves with her uneven breaths in these seconds of silence, before the ship flares back to life and a piece of shrapnel shoots between them to slice open the woman’s face.

…

…

Rey bolts up in her bed expecting to see the treehouse, her clothes sticking to her skin with a cold sweat as she brings a hand to her sternum to feel her pulse. She breathes out slowly and counts as she inhales deeply, laying back on her pillow as she reminds herself she’s on the _Falcon_ and flying away from Kashyyyk. She hasn’t had a nightmare like this since the one in the Forest, reminds herself it isn’t strange that the intensity of her visions would linger in such a manner (and considers she is likely not alone, can’t imagine that Poe would forget so quickly when she remembers his harrowed expression). The ship dips down and pulls up as if someone accidentally elbowed a control, prompting Rey to rest her hand on her stomach to regain her bearings before darting it away lest she leave it there too long. She sighs and closes her eyes again, her body slowly draining and dragging as she relaxes.

Goosebumps trail up her arms as she drifts down, turning over onto her side. She feels a graze across her forehead brushing a lock of hair from her face. She doesn’t shut it out and Kylo settles his hand on her shoulder, leaving it there as the hum of the ship lulls her back to sleep.

— — —

The Resistance touches down on the outskirts of Theed, whose buildings are composed of intricately wrought curves and capped by bright domed roofs. Several structures remain in various states of disrepair in this part of the city, half-renovated or left to ruin due to its inconvenient & unfashionable location even though the battle that took place here ended decades ago. The ships go into hangers and the Resistance are shuffled to a row house a long block up towards the center of the city. They’re on a slight elevation and Rey stops at the top to admire the busy & cosmopolitan central plaza in view, the Royal Palace just as majestic as it looked in that one historical holovid where she had heard of Naboo before.

The Resistance’s numbers are small enough that everyone has little private quarters divided across three floors (with communal freshers in the hallways) and Rey finds herself spending most of her time in her room with a book open on her bed after the first few days of eager exploration. She looks up from the unlocked text to stare at the sky outside her small rectangular window when she realizes they’ve been here seven standard days and she has not felt the bond open since her first night falling asleep on the _Falcon_. And she has not had the nightmare since. A small part of her wonders if Kylo thinks about her at this moment too, and she dismisses it immediately as a juvenile daydream of having a romantic shared fate (being propped by her memory of the Forest’s suggestions). When she lays to rest that night she remembers sleeping beside Kylo in the tent as he held her close, feeling him breathe against her and knowing (even before what happened with Namit  & Cicer) — knowing he would burn the galaxy to the ground for her if he had to — and not knowing the last time she felt as calm and… safe.

She brings her blanket closer and realizes she misses laying beside him, even though it was just that once. Her bed feels lonely and she rests with her head beneath the covers.

Two days later she sees Kylo as she crosses an empty street to visit a local vendor with Poe. Kylo stands with his hands behind his back and some sort of cape over his shoulders, nodding as if in response to something, glancing up to meet Rey’s eyes as she passes. He doesn’t turn his head to follow as Rey walks away. She glances back to see him leaning forward, his hand flat against some surface, and makes a point not to linger too long by following Poe inside. Three days after that she sees him wiping his face with a towel while she reads, but he quickly shuts the bond between them. These small moments continue to crop up occasionally, always beginning with recognition and ending with dismissal as they mostly ignore the other, despite the sadness in his expression.

She throws up her breakfast when it’s the Resistance’s sixteenth day on Naboo, with Rey ducking into a corner while on a walk with Rose. The next night she turns down an offer for a drink, says she wants to get up early when really her stomach turns from the liquor’s smell when she brings the cup too close to her lips. She stands with some women and nods occasionally as they speak, not paying much attention until Connix suggests Millham ask the medidroid up the way for a reliever for monthly symptoms (“it really works”), and Rey’s body suddenly feels strange when she tries to remember the last time that —

She silently counts how long it’s been since those first several days on Kashyyyk and excuses herself to use the fresher, leaving the gathering hall to run into her room and lay down on her bed. Her sleep is restless & dreamless and she wakes before dawn to slip from the row house during the quiet dark morning to walk up to the clinic a few streets away, her footsteps slow and heavy as she opens the door and crosses the threshold.

— — —

Rey tears the slip of paper into tiny pieces, holds them in her fist and lets them litter onto the street in small flakes behind her as she trudges back. She stops to stare at the sky brightening behind the Palace’s turrets with her hands behind her back, expecting something to look odd or different but all remains the same. She bites her lip and glances down to her feet, traces their outlines on the ground with her eyes before ascending the stairs to her room. She locks the door and shutters the window to cast the place in artificial shadow, laying down on her side and unable to sleep. She hears stirring & footsteps in the corridor after laying idle for an indeterminate amount of time as she stares at the wall and practices her blank white screen, not wanting to think about the Force or anything else at all. After another few moments Rey sits up with her feet on the floor, tapping her fingers along the edge of the mattress as she recalls the irony of D’Acy’s words before they left Kashyyyk — how the Resistance would carry nothing with them from their stay in the Forest, despite the confirmation that she does.

She presses down on the bandage where her implant used to be, the clinic’s droid strongly advising she remove it if she’s even considering keeping it at all and remarking on how while it’s rare it is possible, this being the third time the droid’s seen this in its many decades of service.

Rey’s fingers tense on her kneecaps as she stares at the shuttered window, her insides suddenly feeling foreign & full with certain knowledge. She pulls up her shirt and stares down at her stomach with the memory of the implicit promise she made and already knowing what he will say. She rests her hand on her bare skin and the same shiver of awareness runs through her again as she exhales with a deep sigh, returns to her years-old fantasies of having a family of her own when the off-season desert nights ate through her blankets and froze her skin beneath two layers of clothes. As a girl she fell asleep pretending her parents lay on either side until she grew older & harder and slept truly alone, her chest twisting with the reminder of her loneliness and a childish desire to have somewhere she belongs. She would crumple her half-emptied one extra pillow against her chest when she no longer imagined her parents’ faceless arms holding her close, telling herself she’d never do this to her child if she has a family of her own one day. And as she grew older, every once in awhile, she imagined sleeping across from Tanner with a small bundle between them having found some quiet part of the galaxy to make a home of her own choosing.

She lets her shirt fall to cover her resting hand, the air feeling heavy against her back. Sharp calls out to someone in the hall and his companion shushes him as they scurry away down the stairwell. Rey’s face flushes in the quiet room as she’s reminded of Kylo’s vision, the silence weighing her hand still when she asks herself if this is what he saw all along or if they were nudged into a preexisting fate sooner than was meant to be. She remembers telling Kylo to claim her as his with dirt grinding against her knees and considers that maybe both those things are wrong… and that perhaps they brought this entirely on themselves by putting too much intention in their words.

Tears slip down her cheeks when she rounds her belly beneath her fingertips, not feeling sad or happy or anything else besides overwhelmed. She wipes them away and stands to open the shutters, leaving her room to extinguish her building anxiety by moving her feet. 

She walks the block a few times with her cloak’s hood over her face before running into Rose and accompanying her for breakfast. Rey’s unable to keep her creeping sense of dread from her face (the looming reminder of a decision needing to be made feeling like it stands behind her shoulders) — and Rey nods & says she’s fine when Rose asks if she’s okay. Afterwards they walk in one of Theed’s parks and Rey throws up in a sanitation basket on the promenade, wiping her mouth and explaining she’s just a little sick, and pretends she doesn’t see anything change in Rose’s expression.

She makes a conscious effort not to think of Kylo the rest of the day or the next, not wanting him to appear until she knows what she’s going to say. She barely sleeps the two days when she retraces her steps countless times, at moments wishing she had turned and flew from Ahch-To when Luke ignored her outside on the bench as if that may have stopped everything that happened. She picks apart every decision she’s made since she took the _Falcon_ and left everything she ever knew in Jakku. She realizes she’s here on Naboo with the Resistance because she feels like she should be — not out of any real kinship or loyalty to the cause itself beyond striking down the First Order. And despite her easing gradually into this camaraderie and organized lifestyle, being with so many people still feels strange and Rey still cannot stomach being in the same room as Namit  & Cicer as the men recover blissfully unaware. Connix never asks Rey about her theory nor does Nell look at her with anymore knowing grins, and even Finn doesn’t ask why she’s so distracted when they train. D’Acy takes the lead at the next general assembly, with neither Leia or Ematt present, and Rey sighs as she stares down at the list of assignments with the memory of crying trapped in a destroyer’s hull due to a sandstorm and fearing what will happen to her for running late.

She didn’t leave Jakku to take more orders, she tells herself as an excuse for ignoring the cavity growing between her ribs since leaving Kashyyyk, where she feels the weight of her bond with Kylo and her growing acceptance of the fact that maybe much of what she felt was real after all — the Force connected them before the Forest and hasn’t appeared to have given up yet. She’s thankful to stand in the back of the room, darting out the door to return to her bed where she collapses on her blankets to hold her pillow to her chest. And she doesn’t understand why it just feels like the right thing to do is leave despite everything seeming too fast and too orchestrated by whatever the Force has in mind for her. A part of her does know why, a part she’s reluctant to admit to herself — because she _does_ see something there with Kylo aside from physical attraction, someone who has given her his mind as well as his body, someone who could help her understand herself, someone she can imagine a future with far away from everything here no matter how illogical  & irrational it may seem. And she tells herself maybe neither of them have to turn for the other and they’ll end up somewhere in between, where they can fulfill their own expectations for once instead of always following another’s.

…

…

She falls asleep despite it being early evening and when she dreams of the crashing ship the woman says nothing aloud as she squeezes Rey’s shoulders, this time leaning in to leave an icy kiss on her forehead to tell her all will be okay before the shrapnel tears her face open again.

… 

… 

Rey is not startled awake when she opens her eyes in her darkened bedroom, seeing the moons’ light creeping over the floorboards in the late evening hours before the satellites reach their peak. Her clothes feel grainy against her limbs, sighing with the realization that this is not another dream and that she lays in bed with Kylo beside her again. She doesn’t rustle or turn, remaining still as she stares at her painted ceiling with her hands folded over her stomach and lets the flicker dance beneath her palms instead of hiding them away. He shifts his weight but the mattress does not sink, coming up on an elbow to place a lock of hair behind her ear and graze his ungloved fingertips along her cheek. She closes her eyes with the reflection of his touch beneath her skin and he draws his hand away as if anticipating another dismissal, prompting her to turn her head to see him lying on his side beside her. His wide frame crowds the space between her & the wall; he wears a gray sleeveless shirt and dark trousers, watching her face for a signal when she doesn’t shut the bond between them. She meets his gaze and doesn’t know how to greet him or how to say it aloud so she doesn’t speak at all,

_I said I would tell you._

He glances to her hands but his face remains unchanged, and Rey rushes the rest of the words through her mind before she balks from her decision,

_I’m telling you._

His eyes snap up to hers but neither of them move. She waits for another moment to pass between them before tapping her fingers on her belly and he covers them with one of his large hands.

“Really….”

Rey isn’t sure if it’s a statement or a question. She nods slowly and turns on her side to face him, scooting in closer to rest her forehead on his collarbone with a slow exhale when he presses down on her back and her vision blurs with tears. She doesn’t know what to do with her hands so she rests them on his chest and listens to their breaths in the quiet room, everything stilled to a halted silence like when the bond first opened between them. He brings his hand up & down like a stutter along her spine, splaying them open on her shoulder blades when he holds her close against him and runs his nose over her scalp to smell her hair. Rey leans back to look up into his face, feeling small with his arms clutched around her as he kisses her forehead and she senses his elation unfolding with a guarded cautiousness as if unsure what she will say next. He slips beneath her shirt to rest his palm against her skin and Rey sees his eyes widen briefly with recognition before she speaks,

“How soon can you leave?”

He brushes his thumb along her navel as he shifts his jaw. “Two standard days to do it properly.”

“Where can you meet me?”

There’s no hesitation in his response. “Anywhere.”

Rey nods and realizes she doesn’t have an anywhere in mind, imagines crossing a crowd to pick up a timetable from Theed’s shuttle station to see where is the furthest place they will take her. Her cheeks warm beneath the wet streaks of her tears, turning her head when he brings his hand up to wipe them away before shutting his arms around her to bring her close again. Her breaths are soft & shuddered by worry as she inhales the scent of his skin, tracing her lips on his collarbone when he tells her,

“I’m yours.” _No matter what._

She knows he means it. _When will they stop looking for us?_

_Eventually._

“This is crazy,” she sputters with a short laugh, but it doesn’t relieve the tension winding in her chest. They’ll be running until her bounty is taken down and she doesn’t ask if he thinks there will be one out for him. She pictures them finding another quiet place until they’re eventually detected again and have to chart a plan towards a new set of stars, travelling to planets that Rey has never seen. She doesn’t know if she finds it romantic or unsettling and repeats the thought aloud. “This is crazy, Ben.”

He doesn’t say anything and keeps her held against him like the bond may unravel at any moment. She reads his nervousness in his eyes and in the threads of their connection when he agrees wordlessly, his own thoughts reeling elsewhere (to the sickeningly poetic irony so soon after striking down his own father) and Rey pretends she does not hear it — assumes he’d prefer thoughts like these be left alone after having them read for so long.

But she doesn’t really know and her anxieties continue to leave her lips with a small whisper, “I barely even know you.”

It breaks him from his thoughts. “You do know me.”

Rey rolls her eyes. _You know what I mean._

_You’ll know me soon enough._

She supposes so with a sigh and she squirms away to lay again on her back to watch the rectangle of dark sky outside her window. Some silence passes between them before he draws in to kiss her ear. She doesn’t stir and he rests his head beside hers, placing his hand on her sternum. She exhales slowly and lets her chest sink beneath his fingers, expecting to see the ceiling spin but everything remains standing still. He nudges her towards him and whispers her name; she lets him wrap his arms around her to roll her over so that she lays on top of him with her chest pressed against his. She sits up when he rolls off his shirt and lifts her arms above her head so he can remove hers, a small smile curling up the corners of her lips. He rubs her back to guide her down and Rey shuffles over him until she lays on him completely, with her head against his neck and her breasts & stomach pressed against his skin. He traces his thumb along her waist, they just sit there and sense themselves & also the other through their bond, and Rey feels oddly at ease.

She speaks softly into his ear. “This is… this is all so fast.”

“It is.”

She picks up her head to look down into his face, his lids appearing half-closed as if he looks down at something beside her and not wanting to meet her gaze.

“Why is this happening to us?” she asks, even though he doesn’t know.

“Because the Force is bringing us together for a reason.”

 _For a reason,_ she repeats almost sarcastically.

_We’ll find it._

_Or maybe the reason is that we brought it on ourselves._

There’s a beat. _Could be._

She lays back down and closes her eyes as he holds her against him, letting down her defenses with an unsaid tension winding between them. Rey realizes he’s thinking the same thing she is as the trail of words passes loudly in his mind, pretending she does not hear even though he doesn’t hide them from her — that neither of them are ready for this at all despite the joyful rush of leaping into an unknown future. She tries to still her racing heart and counts the days between them, knowing that he feels the same excitement but something else too.

“Ben, I’m scared.”

“Me too.”

He kisses the top of her head and the small flicker turns over & brushes between them, coming to rest along with Rey as she falls back into a peaceful sleep.

— — —

The next afternoon Rey reaches out for him again and they sit cross-legged on her floor to plan their departure, asking Kylo to meet her at the Kala’uun spaceport on Ryloth and they’ll figure it out from there. She says it’s two days by shuttle but doesn’t say from where she departs and he says it’ll take him three days to get there after leaving in one and a half standard cycles without sharing the _Finalizer_ ’s location. She gives him her shuttle’s arrival time and a doubt wrings in her chest (that she will go and he will never come), which he dismisses by grabbing her wrists to pull her in to kiss her lips and tell her again,

“I’m yours.”

He means it in his grip & tone and she believes it.

She expects to be sentimental over these days in between but only notices how apart she is from everyone else instead, the remainder of the Resistance falling into rank and a casual comfort with one another that Rey can’t seem to fit into. The same individuals that maintained their distance before continue to do so now, as if she’s a strange powerful being that may bite. The same sets of women greet her; the same sets refuse to meet her gaze. She eats breakfast with Rose and keeps it all down, telling her with a smile that she really is okay when asked again if something is on her mind. She trains with Finn and he tells her to stop holding back when she fails to dodge a halfhearted strike, halting his staff a couple inches from her head and trying to read her eyes. She walks from the row house to a spectator’s point at a park to watch the sunrise over the Royal Palace and the ancient city below, amused by her own comparatively tiny place in galactic history. She wonders if she’s fulfilling some greater destiny or making the dumbest decision of her entire life. Or maybe it’s neither and she’ll find some peaceful happiness with him living their days with the Force fluttering between them, exploring ancient ruins and unread texts on strange distant worlds with Ben Solo (with a small child she cannot picture beyond dark hair and a little hand holding hers as they walk up an uneven grassy hill).

She has barely any belongings to pack and they all go in the same backpack no one has asked for and she decided to keep. She pilfers items from the hallway closet designated storage (rations, waters, medikits, and several loosely tied booklets of blank papers that appear to belong to the row house instead of the Resistance). She spends her last daylight hours as if nothing is changing, even nodding in time with the others at general assembly in the late afternoon. Poe gets in front of the group and discusses putting together a crew for an off-site scouting mission on a potential location for a more permanent base. He meets Rey’s eyes as he does with a small smile to let her know he already planned to ask and she returns it with a nod even though his letter lays written beneath her shuttered window.

The sky turns dark and Rey puts on her own cloak (wishes she hadn’t discarded the new goggles), bringing the hood over her head and glancing over the empty room one more time. She swings the pack onto her shoulders with a sigh reminding her she can still turn back now, shaking her head as the beams of light across the floor seem to ripple before she turns to leave. She holds her staff instead of tying it to her back, using it to walk towards the stairwell with slow & steady clunks. She admires the way the noise echoes in the empty hallway, bringing it into both hands for silence as she descends one flight and waits at the end of the corridor to watch a pair of figures outside Leia’s room. She recognizes Poe and 3PO and they only stand for a few moments before stepping away and out of view — and she realizes this may be the last time she ever sees Poe at all.

Rey presses her lips together and slips down the hallway, stopping in front of the general’s room. She turns both ways to check she’s alone still before looking to her feet, not watching her hands as she uses her staff to knock softly on the door. She clenches her jaw a moment when she hears Leia say “come in, Rey” without asking who stands outside. She holds her breath and pushes the unlocked door, poking her head inside to see Leia sitting on a flattened-looking sofa in one corner.

Leia wears a simple shirt, vest, and trousers, her hair pulled back with her hands folded on her lap. She nods to the space beside her as an invitation, tilting her head when she asks, “You wanted to see me?”

Rey shuffles in and closes the door behind her, facing away from Leia when she rests her staff & bag against the wall. She counts to three before turning around and crossing the room to sit as close as possible to the other end of the seat. Rey doesn’t know where to begin so she starts with the easiest part, even though her gaze and words are directed to Leia’s feet.

“I’m… I’m leaving tonight and won’t be — I don’t know when I’ll be coming back.” Rey sees Leia’s hands shift in her periphery as the silence prompts Rey to continue, not wanting to sever all her ties here entirely. “It’ll probably be… a year at least. Maybe less, maybe more.”

Rey stops because she doesn’t have anything else to say yet and Leia nods slowly. “So soon?”

It’s all she asks and Rey expected more questions like “why” and “will you ever actually come back,” biting the inside of her cheek as it flushes with the realization that she’s expected to go on. She looks directly into Leia’s eyes before losing her nerve.

“I made you a promise and I intend to keep it.” She pauses. “To bring your son home, it just might not be here.” Rey’s face burns brighter and she looks away to the closed door. “I’ll… find a way to put him in touch.”

And it seems so strange, sitting here in an old woman’s room with its blank painted walls and telling her that she’ll have her son call home. Rey covers her lips with her teeth trying to sort through what to say without thinking about it too loudly and she turns when she hears Leia speak beside her.

“Can I?”

She blinks twice and doesn’t understand for a moment until Leia pats the cushion to encourage Rey to come closer. Her heart pounds suddenly, heavily enough for Rey to worry it may exit her chest, and she scoots in to sit beside Leia. She takes off her cloak and tosses it onto the armrest, leaning back against the cushion and staring at a tiny vacant piece of wall in front of her. She shifts her weight in her seat and tries to keep her shaky limbs steady by her sides, keeping absolutely still when she feels Leia rest her palm on her stomach.

It’s silent for a few seconds and Rey turns to see Leia’s eyes soften with recognition, a glimmer of happiness dancing over her lips. But Rey swears that for a moment there’s a concern darkening her expression as well, the general shaking her head with an unsteady smile.

“Was starting to think it’d never happen.” But Leia doesn’t seem to say it to anyone in particular. She drops her hand and brings it up to squeeze Rey’s shoulder, meeting her eyes.

“You’ll do great.”

…

…

Rey slips her letters to Rose, Chewie, and Poe beneath their doors before going down to the lobby, bringing her hood back onto her head as she steps outside and grinds her staff against the ground. She told Finn to meet her at this time and that it was very important — and she remembers his hesitant nod while she waits several feet from the row house’s entrance, turning back to see it open. Finn wears the brown jacket Poe gave him, appearing much like he did when Rey first met him and they fled towards their new lives together (and it seems so strange that now they are here and their paths are winding apart). His hands stay in his pockets and he watches the ground as he walks up to Rey, glancing up to meet her eyes.

“I thought you might be leaving.” He’s looking at her backpack as he says it. “Had a feeling, but was hoping I was wrong.”

Rey remains still and watches Finn grasp for something in his fingertips as she confirms with a nod. “Do you trust me?”

He shifts his weight on his feet. “Of course I do, Rey. Just… are you really sure this is what you want to do?”

His words are heavy and filled with meaning in Rey’s ears. She crosses her arms and glances both ways to confirm they are alone, stepping in closer and bringing her voice low, as if the closed shop next to them may hear.

“I don’t know.” She takes a small breath. “But maybe this is my chance to…” She shakes her head, feeling silly as she says it, “Maybe it’s my chance to follow my own path. Create my own future.”

Rey expects to see dismissal, but there’s a certain understanding in his expression instead. Finn offers a weak smile and asks, “Any plan for how to do that yet? With the Force?”

She chuckles and it’s genuine, even if constricted. “I guess. Probably starting with finding somewhere to blend in and figure out these books.”

Her sigh is deep yet optimistic, cut off when she watches Finn go to his pocket again. He takes out a small two-way communicator and places it in Rey’s unoccupied palm, closing his hand around hers for a couple seconds before letting go.

“I know you don’t have one so got this and it’s really… simple, just for voice comms and nothing else.” He swallows and insists, “Call me if you ever need me. Just call me. Doesn’t matter what time it is or where you are.” It’s easy to tell he’s worried, the sentiment obvious in every feature on his face as he stops himself from saying the implication aloud. “Or if you ever just want to say hi.”

Rey realizes Finn thinks Kylo will hurt her, but doesn’t explain that she would never let him, instead struck by how deeply Finn cares for her wellbeing. She opens her hand to examine the communicator, her chest sinking with the growing acceptance of leaving her one true friend and the home she thought she’d find in the same place he found his. And even now Finn offers to keep being something to rely on despite everything changing so quickly around her. She realizes he’s saying he will be there for her even now and Rey isn’t sure she deserves it after leading him astray. She smiles brightly and thinks again how she is tired of crying as a tear wets her cheek, wiping it away with the fabric of her cloak when she says,

“I will. Say hi, I mean.”

She pockets the communicator and clears her throat after Finn asks,

“Is there anything else you need to tell me?”

Rey remembers Rose’s raised eyebrows and her face flushes, letting her pause hang between them before literally shaking away the compulsion to lie her way out of a potentially awkward moment. But she cannot bear to see his expression when she tells him, not right here.

“Yes, but… I can’t really say anything right now.”

He presses his lips together, his eyes creasing with some disappointment as if he expected this response.

“But I will soon. I promise,” she adds.

Finn rests his hand on her upper arm and doesn’t press her any further, reminding her instead, “Call me if you need anything. Anything at all.”

Rey pushes in to wrap her arms around him tightly, clasping her hands behind his back to hug him hard. They embrace for what feels like a long time before she leans back and leaves her hand on Finn’s shoulder, nodding again to remind herself to move her feet.

“I’ll see you again soon.”

“Be careful, Rey.”

She whispers that she will with a small wave and slips away into the darkness, turning back to see Finn standing like a ghost in the empty street as he watches her leave.

— — —

On the shuttle she takes one of the blank notebooks and fills it with small lines not unlike the marks she left on her AT-AT’s walls. The similarity does not elude her and she rubs her hand over her belly as she measures the days. She smiles softly with the thought that she’s finally counting towards something as she places the paper back into her bag and reclines her chair to try and get some sleep. Kylo is waiting for her in the station when she arrives, spotting him leaning against a far wall where a cart sells cups of caf, in plain black clothing and a green visor hiding his face as he watches the ground with his arms crossed. Rey taps the brim down to greet him with a teasing smile & says he looks silly, and he responds by bending towards her to cover her mouth with his — she holds his cheeks and kisses him back, hears a twi’lek snort in the line nearby them.

They spend four days on Ryloth, the first day mostly spent tangling the sheets of the inn’s bed and the second spent with a printed galaxy map unrolled on the floor as they circle unaffiliated destinations and places with populations unlikely to tip off the First Order. Kylo did not bring a holopad or comlink to avoid potential tracking, lays down his own two-way communicator and tells Rey there is one knight he can trust to call if they’re spotted, but she does not show him her device until the next morning. On the third day he brings her to where he hid his Silencer and they strip it down at her discretion, saving valuable parts and selling the rest for scrap on the fourth day. She can tell it bothers him despite it being his suggestion; the both of them are surprised the junker asks literally nothing about how a high-class modified TIE came in their hands and gives them their pay very eagerly.

They depart on a shuttle and don’t procure another ship until the location after next. Rey’s bounty remains unchanged and Kylo’s is posted when it’s fifteen marks added since leaving Naboo, both their listings noted with a warning that they may be travelling together. She calls Finn to tell him she’s safe at twenty new marks and he tells her per their intel one shrewd surveillance worker copied & hid some incriminating footage he found very shortly before Kylo wiped it along with his memory. It was eventually found when all obscure archive banks were scoured for anything odd after Kylo’s sudden disappearance.

The days melt into weeks and months as they stay put for a little while drifting between towns before setting off somewhere new again, not wanting to tarry too long lest they garner suspicion. Sometimes they stay in an inn or a forgotten outpost and sometimes they spend days with their tent pitched amongst flora Rey has never seen. She keeps buds from unique flowers, drying them in the pages of one of her notebooks and tying them into bunches with string. They trade for new paper books to keep their load light, keeping some along the way, and Rey discovers new histories & tales she’s never heard before. It takes her awhile to accept Kylo’s offer to improve her malformed handwriting and sometimes she spends an hour or two slowly copying poems into another one of her notebooks.

She shows him how to barter with unscrupulous parts dealers without assistance from the Force and how to repair their second-hand ship on multiple occasions, later sitting beside his feet to direct him when it gets trickier to lay on her back and roll underneath. She keeps them focused when unexpected elements disrupt their path, able to hone her natural drive for last-minute survival from so many near-misses in the desert sands. At the times when she becomes insatiable he’s more than happy to oblige, even once making her come on his hand while waiting for an innkeeper to check them in. She calls Finn every few weeks and he reminds her of a life and of people she no longer knows; when she does tell him about the baby, he says he and Rose already kind of figured.

Finn always asks if she’s okay and she means it when she tells him she’s fine. She’s honest when Finn asks about Kylo’s temper and says it’s there (declines to mention the two times she had to intervene more seriously when a third party set him off). She relents that they do argue at times, but it’s not generally unpleasant to be with him and she’s not sure Finn believes her. Yet he does hand his communicator to Leia at forty-nine new marks and Rey gives hers to Kylo, staying by their camp as he walks down a trail alone to speak with her. Rey doesn’t ask what they discussed when he gets back despite a distanced despair in his face and he doesn’t volunteer even a small part of it until a much longer time later.

She determines aloud she’s a little more than five months along and he asks if she would take him to Jakku to show him her life there. She does not want to but agrees, fulfilling his vision when she reads the names of her sellers on a yellowed buyers note and finding them again on a crashed ship’s manifest only two hours later. She does not speak when she folds the slip and places it back away, thanks the mentally-nudged financial archivist for his assistance, and cries on Kylo’s shoulder in the hull of her old AT-AT when they arrive — tells him she saw the ship explode in the skies herself and doesn’t know why she always refused to believe it. Everything is shockingly untouched in her former home and he holds her close as she falls asleep watching the old marks on her wall, reminding her that she is no longer bound here and they never have to return again.

Something about their time there leaves a cavity inside him and while he doesn’t tell her in words, she can feel it in his maneuvers when they train and in the tendrils of their bond when they meditate with it open between them. They find an inn to sleep and he lets her invade his mind again, swimming beneath the hollowness he feels when shown the emptiness of her past compared to the privilege & undermined opportunities of his. She clenches and wilts around him as he wordlessly circles her clit below, her soft moans filling the room when he breaks his hold to watch her changed body grind over his skin. He shudders and tells her how heavy & hard she feels soaking against his cock, lets her sees herself as he does when she closes her eyes and leans back with his movements. He lays his hand on her rounded stomach and asks her to hit him and say he’s a monster for what he’s done to her — and she obliges even though it seems strange when he comes so hard from it and doesn’t understand why when she senses he really believes it.

It’s sixteen days later when he shakes her awake in Coruscant, the two having gone there despite the risk of being seen because she always wanted to visit. His face is pale and drenched in sweat from running back, furiously packing their things and telling her to move quickly. Rey keeps asking why until he shouts and says there are two bodies three blocks away and they have to go now. He crushes his communicator with the heel of his boot before they leave, grabbing her wrist and hurrying her along to the ship, repeating _later_ every time she yelps _why, tell me, please, you’re scaring me_ across the bond but he doesn’t loosen his grip when she asks him to let go. She sits silently in the co-pilot’s seat until they’re off-world towards their next designated location and this time when she asks why he takes his hands from the controls, turning to face her eyes when he says he was protecting them. And shows how he sensed  & overheard two undercover marksmen, finalizing their tactical plan to kill him and take her to study their child. Kylo curled his hand to crack their necks from afar and fled as their bodies fell silently to the alley’s floor. He tells Rey aloud he’s going to keep her safe no matter what while his thoughts race with the realization that he didn’t actually need to kill them.

He asks Rey why he still falls to Darkness as she watches the emptiness of space through the cockpit window and she bites her lip as she feels a soft flutter of movement inside her. She wonders if he expects her to offer to be a beacon when her eyelashes mat together with tears, instead saying she can’t pretend she doesn’t understand. She explains further when he asks what she means, her breaths shuddering as she first tells him aloud about what happened in Kachirho and the voice that led her to wave her hand to topple Errol from the bridge. The same voice that pushed her back and told her to leave. She says nothing of what happened in between.

Kylo blinks and she can see he’s baffled he never accessed this memory before, not once during the times they’ve yielded their entire selves to the other. Rey’s surprised he’s caught so off-guard, not having purposefully hidden it from him (had assumed he already knew in some way already), and he glances between her eyes & belly before standing up and walking into the fresher. He lingers and Rey knows he’s just standing there thinking alone, leaving him be as she glances back at her pack. It’s the only time Rey seriously considers Finn’s reminder to call no matter where she is, with an implicit offer to pick her up and take her home. Kylo returns to his seat silently and they don’t discuss it again until a couple days later while she sits eating a piece of fruit beneath a shady tree. They determine to continue their course and agree they will eventually find some sort of comfort with the lingering Darkness within them.

They explore ruins and caves, visit festivals with strange foods & bright colored lights, and watch the sunrise over ever-changing landscapes. She sees planets she’s only read about and many more she’s never even heard of beyond their map. They trade & sell parts, hunt for food when they sleep on the ground, do odd jobs for credits, and take in so many things and places that Rey sometimes can’t believe are even real. They roam the galaxy with purpose but without destination — her body growing along with her wondering if they will actually find whatever goal the Force has for them as their exercises, meditations, and readings yield very few epiphanies. The tally marks tread closer to completing a second page and at a point her steps become slower & her back gets sore more easily, unable to go quite as far without needing to rest her feet.

She shows Kylo the notebook and he says they should find someplace more safe to stay a while, asking where she would like to go next. She realizes he’s asking her to choose where their child is born, closing her eyes a moment to picture water pouring out to fill the line beneath a sunrise’s horizon. She says she’d like to go somewhere with an ocean and he pulls his reference book to review small stable colonies in the Outer Rim. Neither of them mention the fact that the room from Kylo’s vision never appeared and there’s a heaviness behind plotting this destination that Kylo does not address beyond the flickers of self-doubt through their bond.

They chart their path and leave the next day, with Rey taking the controls as Kylo reclines in the co-pilot’s seat. She blushes when he asks if she realizes she sits differently and she straightens her posture when she counters that she’d like to see him walk around like this for how many days — He sits up and leans in to kiss her, bringing his lips to her ear to tell her she’s perfect and he’s just teasing her, reaching his arm across her to flip a switch and telling her to go. She lets her thoughts blend in with the awareness of the controls gripped in her hands, accepting the finality of the fact that this will likely be their last interplanetary flight alone together for a rather long time. She looks over to see Kylo leaning and watching the paths of distant stars with a small smile.

They land the ship in a thicket of trees with other tied down vessels, paying for storage under a pair of names they’ve used a couple times before. They maintain the same persona as they enter the colony’s one small town, wandering to a wooden stall advertising inexpensive lodging on its holovid display and asking to be shown the rooms. The attendant waves over an older hunched humanoid that reminds Rey of Maz who directs them down a winding trail to the sea, leading them to the first bungalow at the elevated treeline where the sand meets the grass. He says this one is the smallest & cheapest but has its charms, unlocking the door and pushing it open for them to follow inside. Rey is stunned to silence when she recognizes the main room and furnishings from Kylo’s vision, meeting his eyes as he grins and tells the man they’ll take it.

Kylo opens their bond to share his joy with her, as if finding this place has answered some unresolved question. He kisses her hard when they’re finally alone and says he always knew he was meant to be hers & her as his, their connection weaving together like a greater purpose has been found between them. They unpack their things and he holds her close with her back against his chest as they lay down to sleep. He tells her he loves her & she says she loves him and she sighs into the rise & fall of his breaths, thinking that maybe she has found the home she’s always seeked — crafting her own future in the marked boundaries of some obscure destiny neither of them understand still.

That night she dreams once more of the crashing ship, this time the woman offering two words before she kisses Rey’s cheek:

_Go see._

And all the tally marks and worries and months spent slowly collecting things for an intangible concept comes to its breaking point five weeks later on a sunny afternoon on the floor by the fireplace. Rey howls & cries as her body breaks and squeezes like a tightening vice, at times wresting her hand from Kylo’s and at others crushing his fingers in her grip. She grits her teeth and tries to even her breaths with the rush & pain searing through her in harsh clamps for hours that seem to have no end, crying out and wilting against Kylo’s shirt when he swipes aside loose locks of hair slicked against the sweat on her face. Eventually Rey bears down hard and the midwife taps Kylo’s shoulder & gestures for him to come see; Rey gasps for one last deep breath and sees the woman’s eyes widen as she notices all the books in the room floating in the air. She shakes it off & comes down between Rey’s knees with a swath of cloth in her hands and tells her to push hard like that once more — the books falling to the floor as Rey screams and Kylo pales, followed by a messy streaked sound and soft tiny cries, so small but vibrant as they fill Rey’s ears. Rey’s heart lurches & swells with a euphoric joy that careens down her every limb and bursts beneath her skin, making a sound somewhere between laughing and crying as her face brightens with her smile.

And she never imagined that she could feel something like this, the happiness of loving this small part of herself she brought to exist — overwhelmed by the exhilaration of finding her place in this strange world as Kylo kisses her temple and she looks down at her daughter in her arms.

…

…

It isn’t until two days later that Rey addresses the question aloud, when they sit by the fire with their nameless child sleeping against Rey’s chest.

“You were so sure she would be a son,” Rey states with a smirk, watching Kylo graze his fingers over the infant’s forehead.

He sits back and meets Rey’s eyes a moment before looking towards the wooden wall behind her back instead. He shifts his jaw as well as how he sits.

“It was a son. I’m sure of it.”

“Maybe you just assumed.”

He doesn’t say anything.

“A little bit of wishful thinking?” she quips with a raised eyebrow, rewrapping a fallen corner from the blanket.

Kylo shakes his head. “No, it wasn’t that, it —”

He stops himself mid-sentence as if he’s no longer so sure and picks up his gloves from the floor. There’s a beat of silence before he re-seats himself beside Rey, putting an arm around her shoulder as she leans against his side. The baby stirs and Rey adjusts her hold with a small shhh when Kylo clears his throat.

“My mother knew,” he says with an air of both finality and curiosity, resting a hand on her waist. “Before she ended the call. She said to make sure I take my grandmother’s dresses for our daughter.”

Rey blinks. “What did you say?”

“Nothing.”

Rey nods and doesn’t ask anything more, not wanting to admit a certain satisfaction in his having this one detail wrong. Despite the Force putting its pieces in place, perhaps it’s always been her course to determine after all — and she feels a small flicker of pride in her power to upend the best-laid plans of even the galaxy’s very substance.

They decide to start calling her Lilah the next day and the name fits. They agree to stay here until she’s one-hundred days old, if they can, but probably shouldn’t tarry any longer.

— — —

It is a couple months later when Rey places a glass in the cupboard and closes the door, crosses the room and stands behind the couch to look over Kylo’s shoulder and see what he’s reading. She runs her hand through his hair and he flips the text to show her the cover, a transcribed oral history of the colony printed in unevenly-laid lines.

“Will you be up much longer?” she asks as the fire flickers quietly in the room.

She scratches his ear with a grin and he leans back against the armrest, opening the text back to its prior place. “Probably not.”

“Should try to rest before Lilah wakes up.”

He nods and turns a page. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

Rey drops her hand and says she’s going to lay down, stopping at the entrance to the semi-darkened bedroom to pluck a petal hanging by an edge from one of the dried flowers on the wall. The warm orange light from the main room casts a beam across the small bedroom that ends by the foot of the simple crib they built together and Rey walks over to stand and watch Lilah sleep. She seems so small & helpless wrapped in her blanket and yet feels like the biggest thing in the galaxy, the greatest treasure Rey could ever find in the vast spaces between the stars. Rey smiles when Lilah’s lips purse and relax, the tiny movement making Rey wonder about what a baby sees when she dreams and there’s so much she does not know. 

Rey exhales softly and stays a few seconds more before laying down on her back and closing her eyes. She listens as Kylo writes some notes in the margins of the book before closing it and setting it onto the ground. She hears him shuffle around the room as he closes the cabin for the night and Lilah wriggles & sighs. As Rey drifts off to sleep she considers how during these quiet moments she thinks she feels some of that peace she looked for when she laid alone in the desert sands and wondered if she would ever find her place & would ever control her own destiny. Maybe this is where it is.

…

…

Rey blinks blearily, leans up in bed and realizes she dozed off. She lays on her side facing the crib, gaining her bearings to see Kylo leaning over Lilah and watching her sleep. There’s a faraway look in his profile, as if trying to remind himself this isn’t some prolonged dream.

“Don’t wake her up,” Rey whispers. “She’ll be up before long anyway.”

Kylo doesn’t stir and stands another moment, a small smile turning up the corners of his lips as he bends down to kiss Lilah’s forehead — But he lingers for a few seconds, coming up slowly as the joy drains from his face, his fingers shifting along the crib’s rail.

Rey sits up and rubs her eyes as something in his expression churns an uneasy rolling inside her chest. “What is it, Ben?”

Kylo rushes to place his palm on Lilah’s forehead, her body looking even tinier & more vulnerable beneath the span of his hand. Rey can see him pale despite the darkness in the room, the fingers still on the rail tensing up and shuddering against the beam.

“Rey —”

His mouth falls open and his voice is so heavy & apprehensive that Rey springs from the bed to rush to his side, his hand recoiling as she rests one of her own on Kylo’s back. He appears as if the entire galaxy has been taken out from beneath him, unable to form the words as he gestures to Lilah and his eyes soften & glass over. Rey furrows her brows and rests her palm on Lilah’s forehead, brushing her thumb over a soft wisp of dark hair as she peers beneath, watching her small breaths —

And Rey gasps and staggers backwards from the crib. Her hands cover her mouth and her eyes widen as she meets Kylo’s gaze with a looming understanding that sinks & lowers her entire body through the floor. Kylo crosses the room to hold her steady as her knees bend and the words she heard ring loudly and echo over & over in her ears:

_Imagine all that we can do together_  
_when I can see your mind, see your every intent,_  
_when you came to me with all your potential_  
_waiting for me to bring you here to free me from that place —_

_Think of all the power that darkness brings,  
think of all the things that I can show you —_

_Go see._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...
> 
> ...
> 
> ;)
> 
> Thank you for making it to the end of this story. Huge thank you to my betas [elemie89](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elemie89), [hellyjellybean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hellyjellybean), and [lovefromyourginger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovefromyourginger) for your insights and for listening to my goofy ideas. Thank you to everyone who cheered me on to complete this and thank you to all the awesome people I met along the way. Thank you to everyone who read, commented, subscribed, left kudos, and sent me tweets. And an extra big thank you to my husband for encouraging me to start posting and to keep it up :)
> 
> Had such a fun time with this little writing experiment with genre & mood, which came about after deciding to combine some of my favorite things (horror + smut + Star Wars) to see if I can manage to put out a coherent spooky tale. Did you like it? What did you think? What worked, what didn't? Do you have any questions? Leave a comment and let me know, your feedback helps me grow as a writer AND adds ten years to my life.
> 
> If you enjoyed, then share with your friends looking for a completed spooky long-read just in time for Halloween -- and just wow thank you so much again. Can't believe I finished this!
> 
> ...
> 
> Come say hi and follow me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/theselittlefics). I have a [Tumblr](http:/littlethingsfic.tumblr.com) but only use it for lurking/links. User subscribe for future stories and keep an eye out for Salem Witch Trials AU to start posting soon.
> 
> ily reylos xoxo


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